SA-15(1)—Development Process, Standards, And Tool

Organizations use quality metrics to establish minimum acceptable levels of information system quality. Metrics may include quality gates which are collections of completion criteria or sufficiency standards representing the satisfactory execution of particular phases of the system development project. A quality gate, for example, may require the elimination of all compiler warnings or an explicit determination that the warnings have no impact on the effectiveness of required security capabilities.

During the execution phases of development projects, quality gates provide clear, unambiguous indications of progress. Other metrics apply to the entire development project. These metrics can include defining the severity thresholds of vulnerabilities, for example, requiring no known vulnerabilities in the delivered information system with a Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) severity of Medium or High.