System Security Plan, security assessment plan, assessment report, customer responsibility matrix and continuous monitoring evidence, handed to the customer under NDA so your own assessor can review it rather than taking a vendor claim on trust.
Guide
CMMC, FedRAMP and equivalency
CMMC and FedRAMP get used interchangeably, and they are not the same thing. One governs your systems. The other governs the cloud products you put your data into. This guide sets out the difference in plain English, explains the equivalency route DoD created for providers who cannot get an agency sponsor, and shows how your choice of deployment decides whose assessment your CUI sits inside. Drawn from the VisibleThread webinar with Ignyte, September 2026.
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In this guide we cover
Two frameworks, two different jobs
CMMC covers contractor information systems and is measured against NIST SP 800-171. FedRAMP covers cloud service offerings and is measured against NIST SP 800-53. There is no formal reciprocity between them, and the July 2026 pause did not change the cloud provider requirement.
What equivalency actually means
Ready, Authorized and Equivalent are three different things, and only one of them meets the DoD memo. Equivalency means a full assessment against the FedRAMP Moderate baseline by a recognized 3PAO, with findings closed rather than left open, because there is no agency official to accept the risk.
Where your CUI can live
Four deployment options, from on premises and private cloud through to single tenant US GovCloud and public multi tenant. The question is not which is more secure, it is whose assessment the system sits inside and where the compliance work happens.
What the evidence package contains
