ASD Essentials · Interactive walkthrough

See how an Essentials assessment works

A guided demonstration of the framework, the priority phases that decide the order of work, and a sample gap analysis on four practices - ending in the same prioritised summary the workbook produces.

Demonstration only · sample answers stay in your browser · not an official ASD assessment or certification

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The ASD Essentials in one minute

A short look at what the Essentials series sets out to do, before we walk through an assessment.

The Australian Signals Directorate's Australian Cyber Security Centre (ASD's ACSC) developed ASD Essentials as an evolution of the Essential Eight to help organisations direct cyber security investment towards the areas of greatest need. Through a prioritised, outcome-focused approach, it guides organisations in sequencing their efforts to protect critical functions, reduce risk earlier, and scale improvements across enterprise IT, cloud and operational technology environments.

  1. Posture reporting gives greater visibility. Rather than a single maturity level, posture is reported by domains: groupings of business functions and assets that share similar risks. Domains can be prioritised, so the most critical assets are protected first.
  2. Existing Essential Eight investment remains valuable. The framework builds on the Essential Eight rather than replacing it. See Transitioning from the Essential Eight.
  3. Executive accountability is more explicit. Greater emphasis on formal executive and board-level accountability, including oversight of organisational risk, investment and resourcing. See Executive oversight.

Not starting again

The introduction of the Essentials series does not mean organisations are expected to start again. The transition should begin by understanding how existing Essential Eight controls and other cyber security investments contribute to alignment.

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Ready to assess your own environment?

The workbook covers nine areas and 32 practices, and builds the same prioritised view from your own answers.

Open the workbook

This walkthrough is an informational demonstration. It is not an official ASD assessment, certification or endorsement, and it does not replace the ASD publications themselves. Framework text and figures are reproduced from the ASD Essentials series, © Commonwealth of Australia, provided under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence (creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0); the original publications at cyber.gov.au remain authoritative.