Secure configuration guidance for CIPHER GRC

Last updated 12 November 2026

Version 1.1. This guide recommends how to set up and run CIPHER GRC securely. It covers the top-level administrative accounts that control a company’s whole CIPHER GRC workspace, and the privileged roles under them.

Account types

• Core administrator. One per company, created when the company is set up. It exists so the company can always reach its workspace, including when its identity provider is unavailable. It cannot be deleted or have its role changed by anyone in the company.
• CIPHER Admin. The administrator role for day-to-day control of the workspace: identity, users and roles, systems, telemetry connections and the trust center.
• Privileged roles. Approver, System Owner, Engineer, Compliance operations and Author. Each can do specific work; none can change who has access.

Core administrator

Access it securely

• Assign it to a dedicated company mailbox that more than one trusted person monitors, not to an individual’s personal mailbox.
• Name an executive sponsor and a second point of contact when the company is set up. They are notified when the account is used.
• The first sign-in uses a one-time code delivered outside the application. Use it promptly; it expires.

Configure it

• Set a long passphrase that is used nowhere else.
• Add a second factor. A passkey or hardware security key is recommended because it resists phishing. An authenticator app is accepted and is not phishing-resistant.
• Set up the emergency sign-in materials and store them in your company’s password vault or a safe with limited access.
• Register your identity provider, test it with a real sign-in, then activate it. Require multi-factor authentication at your identity provider.

Operate it

• After your identity provider is active, use the core administrator only in an emergency. People do their daily work through the identity provider.
• Treat any notice that the account was used, or that a sign-in was requested, as something to check. If it was not expected, follow the instructions in the notice to stop emergency sign-in for your company, and contact us.
• Replace the emergency sign-in materials when a person who had access to them leaves or changes role.

Decommission it

• When your company stops using CIPHER GRC, ask us to deactivate the core administrator. Only CIPHER Platforms can deactivate it.
• Destroy the stored emergency sign-in materials and remove the CIPHER GRC application from your identity provider.

Settings only a CIPHER Admin can change

Settings for privileged roles

• Separate the roles. CIPHER GRC lets one person hold several roles and records when the same person requests and approves. Decide which combinations your company accepts and write down why.
• One role at a time. A person acts in one role per session and switches role deliberately. Work in the least privileged role that fits the task.
• Approvals. Approvers and System Owners should read the record they are approving. An approval is permanent and names the person.

Secure defaults

These are on for every company and cannot be turned off: sessions end after a period without activity and after a maximum length, sign-in through an identity provider requires a signed response, every administrative action is logged with who did it, and each company’s data is kept apart from every other company’s.

Changes to this guide

Questions about this guide go to cipher-alerts@traverge.com.

Back to CIPHER GRC