This multipart standard ISO/IEC 15408 defines criteria, which for historical and continuity purposes are referred to herein as the Common Criteria (CC), to be used as the basis for evaluation of security properties of IT products and systems. By establishing such a common criteria base, the results of an IT security evaluation will be meaningful to a wider audience.
The CC will permit comparability between the results of independent security evaluations. It does so by providing a common set of requirements for the security functions of IT products and systems and for assurance measures applied to them during a security evaluation. The valuation process establishes a level of confidence that the security functions of such products and systems and the assurance measures applied to them meet these requirements. The evaluation results may help consumers to determine whether the IT product or system is secure enough for their intended application and whether the security risks implicit in its use are tolerable.
The CC is useful as a guide for the development of products or systems with IT security functions and for the procurement of commercial products and systems with such functions. During evaluation, such an IT product or system is known as a Target of Evaluation (TOE). Such TOEs include, for example, operating systems, computer networks, distributed systems, and applications.
The CC addresses protection of information from unauthorised disclosure, modification, or loss of use. The categories of protection relating to these three types of failure of security are commonly called confidentiality, integrity, and availability, respectively. The CC may also be applicable to aspects of IT security outside of these three. The CC concentrates on threats to that information arising from human activities, whether malicious or otherwise, but may be applicable to some nonhuman threats as well. In addition, the CC may be applied in other areas of IT, but makes no claim of competence outside the strict domain of IT security.
The CC is applicable to IT security measures implemented in hardware, firmware or software. Where particular aspects of evaluation are intended only to apply to certain methods of implementation, this will be indicated within the relevant criteria statements.
Certain topics, because they involve specialised techniques or because they are somewhat peripheral to IT security, are considered to be outside the scope of the CC. Some of these are identified below.
a) The CC does not contain security evaluation criteria pertaining to administrative security measures not related directly to the IT security measures. However, it is recognised that a significant part of the security of a TOE can often be achieved through administrative measures such as organisational, personnel, physical, and procedural controls. Administrative security measures in the operating environment of ISO/IEC 15408-1:1999(E) © ISO/IEC the TOE are treated as secure usage assumptions where these have an impact on the ability of the IT security measures to counter the identified threats.
b) The evaluation of technical physical aspects of IT security such as electromagnetic emanation control is not specifically covered, although many of the concepts addressed will be applicable to that area. In particular, the CC addresses some aspects of physical protection of the TOE.
c) The CC addresses neither the evaluation methodology nor the administrative and legal framework under which the criteria may be applied by evaluation authorities. However, it is expected that the CC will be used for evaluation purposes in the context
of such a framework and such a methodology.
d) The procedures for use of evaluation results in product or system accreditation are outside the scope of the CC. Product or system accreditation is the administrative process whereby authority is granted for the operation of an IT product or system in its full operational environment. Evaluation focuses on the IT security parts of the product or system and those parts of the operational environment that may directly affect the secure use of IT elements. The results of the evaluation process are consequently a valuable input to the accreditation process. However, as other techniques are more appropriate for the assessments of non-IT related product or system security properties and their relationship to the IT security parts, accreditors should make separate provision for those aspects.
e) The subject of criteria for the assessment of the inherent qualities of cryptographic algorithms is not covered in the CC. Should independent assessment of mathematical properties of cryptography embedded in a TOE be required, the evaluation scheme under which the CC is applied must make provision for such assessments.
