Automated testing

The IRS Office of Safeguards utilizes Tenable's industry standard compliance and vulnerability assessment tool, Nessus, to evaluate the security of systems (e.g., Windows, *NIX, Cisco) that store, process, transmit or receive federal tax information. We use Nessus to conduct configuration compliance checks using Center for Internet Security (CIS) benchmarks supplemented with some IRS-specific requirements. This process has been developed to provide agencies with enhanced information regarding the security controls in place to protect FTI.

Preparing for Nessus compliance scanning

The following NESSUS audit files may be used according to the process described in the applicable technical assistance memorandum PDF to evaluate IRS Publication 1075 compliance on systems that store, process, transmit and/or receive federal tax information and are subject to IRC 6103 (p)(4) safeguarding requirements.

The complete set of Nessus Audit Files ZIP are also available.

Audit file Version Upload date
Safeguards AIX 7.1 Audit File

1.3

6/11/2023
Safeguards AIX 7.2 Audit File 1.0 6/11/2023
Safeguards Apache 2.4 Audit File 1.2 6/11/2023
Safeguards CentOS 6 Audit File 2.2.0 6/11/2023
Safeguards CentOS 7 Audit File 3.1.1 6/11/2023
Safeguards CentOS 8 Audit File 1.1.0 6/11/2023
Safeguards CheckPoint Firewall Audit File 1.0 6/11/2023
Safeguards Cisco ASA 9x Audit File 1.1 6/11/2023
Safeguards Cisco iOS 15 Audit File 4.0.1 3/22/2023
Safeguards Cisco iOS 16 Audit File 1.0 6/11/2023
Safeguards Cisco iOS 17 Audit File 1.0 9/28/2023
Safeguards Debian Linux 9 Audit File 1.1 6/11/2023
Safeguards Debian Linux 10 Audit File 1.1 6/11/2023
Safeguards Debian Linux 11 Audit File 1.0 9/27/2023
Safeguards Fortigate Firewall Audit File 1.0 9/27/2023
Safeguards IBM DB2 11 1.0 6/11/2023
Safeguards IIS 8.0 Audit File 1.3 3/22/2023
Safeguards IIS 8.5 Audit File 1.3 6/11/2023
Safeguards IIS 10 Audit File 1.3 6/11/2023
Safeguards MacOS 10.15 Audit File 1.4 6/11/2023
Safeguards MacOS 11 Audit File 1.0 6/11/2023
Safeguards MacOS 12 Audit File 1.0 6/11/2023
Safeguards MacOS 13 Audit File 1.0 9/27/2023
Safeguards NGNIX Webserver Audit File 1.0 9/13/2023
Safeguards Oracle 12c RDBMS Audit File 1.3 6/11/2023
Safeguards Oracle 18c RDBMS Audit File 1.0 6/11/2023
Safeguards Oracle 19c RDBMS Audit File 1.0 6/11/2023
Safeguards Oracle Linux 6 Audit File 2.2.0 6/11/2023
Safeguards Oracle Linux 7 Audit File 3.1.1 6/11/2023
Safeguards Oracle Linux 8 Audit File 1.1.0 6/11/2023
Safeguards Oracle Linux 9 Audit File 1.2 9/28/2023
Safeguards Oracle Solaris 10 Audit File 1.1 6/11/2023
Safeguards Oracle Solaris 11 Audit File 1.1 6/11/2023
Safeguards Oracle Solaris 11.1 Audit File 1.1 6/11/2023
Safeguards Oracle Solaris 11.2 Audit File 1.0 6/11/2023

Safeguards Oracle Solaris 11.4 Audit File

1.2 6/11/2023
Safeguard Palo Alto 10 Firewall Audit File 1.2 01/01/2025
Safeguard Palo Alto 11 Firewall Audit File 1.1 01/01/2025
Safeguards RHEL 6 Audit File 2.2.0 6/11/2023
Safeguards RHEL 7 Audit File 3.1.1 6/11/2023
Safeguards RHEL 8 Audit File 1.1.0 6/11/2023
Safeguards RHEL 9 Audit File 1.2 9/28/2023
Safeguards Rocky Linux 9 Server Audit File 1.0 9/27/2023
Safeguards SQL Server 2012 Audit File 1.1 6/11/2023
Safeguards SQL Server 2014 Audit File 1.1 6/11/2023
Safeguards SQL Server 2016 Audit File 1.4 10/01/2024
Safeguards SQL Server 2017 Audit File 1.3 10/01/2024
Safeguards SQL Server 2019 Audit File 1.3 10/01/2024
Safeguards SQL Server 2022 Audit File 1.1 10/01/2024
Safeguards SUSE 12 Audit File 2.1 6/11/2023
Safeguards SUSE 15 Audit File 1.0 6/11/2023
Safeguards SUSE Linux Enterprise Server11 Audit File 2.1.0 6/11/2023
Safeguards VMware ESXi 7.0 Audit File 1.4 01/01/2025
Safeguards VMware ESXi 8.0 Audit File 1.1 01/01/2025
Safeguards Windows 10 Audit File 6.0 8/8/2024
Safeguards Windows 11 Audit File 3.0 8/8/2024
Safeguards Windows 2012 Audit File 2.1 6/11/2023
Safeguards Windows 2012 R2 Audit File 2.4 6/11/2023
Safeguards Windows Server 2016 Audit File 3.0 8/12/2024
Safeguards Windows 2019 Audit File 1.2 6/11/2023
Safeguard Windows Server 2019 Audit File 2.0 10/24/2024
Safeguards Windows Server 2022 Audit File 2.0 8/8/2024