Calculating security scores - AWS Security Hub

Calculating security scores

The Summary page and Controls page of the Security Hub console display a summary security score across all of your enabled standards. On the Security standards page, Security Hub also displays a security score from 0–100 percent for each enabled standard.

When you first enable Security Hub, Security Hub calculates the summary security score and standard security scores within 30 minutes after your first visit to the Summary page or Security standards page on the Security Hub console. Scores are only generated for standards that are enabled when you visit those pages. To view a list of standards that are currently enabled, invoke the GetEnabledStandards API operation. In addition, AWS Config resource recording must be configured for scores to appear. The summary security score is the average of the standard security scores.

After first-time score generation, Security Hub updates security scores every 24 hours. Security Hub displays a timestamp to indicate when a security score was last updated.

Note

It may take up to 24 hours for first-time security scores to be generated in the China Regions and AWS GovCloud (US) Region.

If you turn on consolidated control findings, it may take up to 24 hours for your security scores to update. In addition, enabling a new aggregation Region or updating linked Regions resets existing security scores. It may take up to 24 hours for Security Hub to generate new security scores that include data from the updated Regions.

Method of calculating security scores

Security scores represent the proportion of Passed controls to enabled controls. The score is displayed as a percentage rounded up or down to the nearest whole number.

Security Hub calculates a summary security score across all of your enabled standards. Security Hub also calculates a security score for each enabled standard. For purposes of score calculation, enabled controls include controls with a status of Passed, Failed, and Unknown. Controls with a status of No data are excluded from the score calculation.

Security Hub ignores archived and suppressed findings when calculating control status. This can impact security scores. For example, if you suppress all failed findings for a control, its status becomes Passed, which can in turn improve your security scores. For more information about control status, see Evaluating compliance status and control status in Security Hub.

Scoring example:

Standard Passed controls Failed controls Unknown controls Standard score

AWS Foundational Security Best Practices v1.0.0

168

22

0

88%

CIS AWS Foundations Benchmark v1.4.0

8

29

0

22%

CIS AWS Foundations Benchmark v1.2.0

6

35

0

15%

NIST Special Publication 800-53 Revision 5

159

56

0

74%

PCI DSS v3.2.1

28

17

0

62%

When calculating the summary security score, Security Hub counts each control only once across standards. For example, if you have enabled a control that applies to three enabled standards, it only counts as one enabled control for scoring purposes.

In this example, although the total number of enabled controls across enabled standards is 528, Security Hub counts each unique control only once for scoring purposes. The number of unique enabled controls is likely lower than 528. If we assume the number of unique enabled controls is 515, and the number of unique passed controls is 357, the summary score is 69%. This score is calculated by dividing the number of unique passed controls by the number of unique enabled controls.

You may have a summary score that differs from the standard security score even if you've only enabled one standard in your account in the current Region. This may occur if you're signed in to an administrator account and member accounts have additional standards or different standards enabled. This may also occur if you're viewing the score from the aggregation Region and additional standards or different standards are enabled in linked Regions.

Security scores for administrator accounts

If you're signed in to an administrator account, the summary security score and standard scores account for control statuses in the administrator account and all of the member accounts.

If the status of a control is Failed in even one member account, its status is Failed in the administrator account and impacts the administrator account scores.

If you're signed in to an administrator account and are viewing scores in an aggregation Region, security scores account for control statuses in all member accounts and all linked Regions.

Security scores if you have set an aggregation Region

If you have set an aggregation AWS Region, the summary security score and standard scores account for control statuses in all
 linked Regions.

If the status of a control is Failed in even one linked Region, its status is Failed in the aggregation Region and impacts the aggregation Region scores.

If you're signed in to an administrator account and are viewing scores in an aggregation Region, security scores account for control statuses in all member accounts and all linked Regions.