AI Governance Assessments · Fractional CISO · Cybersecurity Programs
Your staff already adopted AI.
Nobody governed it.
Adoption outran policy. Then the auditors started asking questions. We evaluate the governance you can actually evidence — policy, process, oversight, accountability — score it across 10 NIST AI RMF domains, and tell you what to fix first.
15 questions · no signup · NIST AI RMF aligned
Or schedule a free 25-minute consultationWhat brought you here?
Something Made You Look Into This
Your board
"What are we doing about AI?"
Leadership asked and the answer was a paragraph of reassurance. Next time it needs to be defensible.
A maturity score against named NIST AI RMF controls, with every finding traced to the policy, process, or accountability gap that produced it — and an executive narrative written to be read by the board without a consultant in the room to interpret it.
An auditor or regulator
"Show us your AI controls."
Good intentions aren't evidence. They want proof mapped to a named obligation.
Every finding references the specific control line in the governing framework — not just the domain — and links back to the response that produced it. Auditable rather than advisory, and every market you operate in asks separately.
A customer
A questionnaire is holding the deal.
Vendor security reviews now ask about AI governance. Yours is stalling a renewal.
A completed, scored assessment against a recognized framework is a document you can hand to a procurement team. Answering their questionnaire from a scored baseline takes hours instead of weeks — and it's the same artifact that satisfies the next customer who asks.
Nobody — yet
You'd rather not be caught out.
No regulator, no audit, no stalled deal. Just a preference for knowing before someone else does.
This is the cheapest moment to do it. Governance built before an obligation arrives costs a fraction of governance retrofitted under an auditor's timetable — and the same assessment becomes your baseline, re-runnable to show improvement over time.
Start here · Free · No signup
Our Snapshots. Directional But Real.
Fast, targeted snapshots for each of our frameworks. On-screen results plus a PDF to take away. Free, no signup, no account.
NIST AI RMF (Full) Snapshot
Deployer or Provider governance posture across all 10 NIST AI RMF domains — with measurement discipline built in.
Start SnapshotNIST AI RMF 600 Snapshot
RMF governance plus GenAI-specific 600-1 obligations. Deployer or Provider path routed via intake.
Start SnapshotEU AI Act Snapshot
Prohibitions, high-risk classification, transparency, GPAI. Weighted severity gauge.
Start SnapshotISO/IEC 42001 Snapshot
AIMS certification readiness assessed against all clauses. Outcome path routed via intake questions.
Start SnapshotThe stakes
You Cannot Fix What You Cannot Measure
The gap between AI ambition and AI governance is not a knowledge problem. It is a visibility problem — and the consequences are already priced.
7%
of global annual turnover
The maximum penalty for prohibited AI practices under the EU AI Act — assessed on worldwide revenue, not the revenue of the offending unit.
EU AI Act, Art. 99 — verify & date before publishing
6+
jurisdictions now regulating AI use
The EU, China's GenAI Interim Measures, California's CCPA, and emerging regimes in Japan, Singapore, and the UK. They don't align with each other, and each one asks separately.
confirm current list before publishing
Personal
accountability sits with leadership
Directors and officers are increasingly answerable for AI risk they cannot see — and most organizations lack the internal expertise to know where to start looking.
soften or source if challenged
Each of our four framework-anchored assessments is fixed-price and flat at $9,000. No tiers. No seat count debates. Intake questions route you to the right content for your role and desired outcome.
See pricingWhy it matters
Auditable, Not Advisory
Framework-aligned assessments built and guided by practitioners — not proprietary checklists, and not a consulting engagement you have to re-scope every time.
Defensible coverage
Every question is authored against a named control in NIST AI RMF, the EU AI Act, or ISO/IEC 42001. Findings cite the specific control line — so you can show an auditor your assessment was structured against the obligation itself, not somebody's interpretation of good practice.
Actionable findings
Each gap produces a finding and a concrete remediation recommendation, tiered Immediate, Short-term, or Strategic. Your team knows what to fix first without needing us to interpret the report for them.
Executive clarity
An executive narrative translates scores into your organization's context — industry, scale of adoption, regulatory obligations, strategic direction. Board-ready as delivered.
What you receive
See the report before you spend a dollar
A scored posture across 10 domains, a severity-tiered findings list, prioritized remediation, and an executive narrative. Interactive web report plus a watermarked, serial-numbered PDF.
View sample reportsHow it works
Four Steps, No Scoping Call Required
1
Configure
Choose your framework and invite participants across departments, roles, or sites — individually or by bulk upload.
2
Assess
Maturity-scaled questions surface real practice rather than aspirational policy. No specialist knowledge needed — and "I don't know" is a valid, scored answer.
3
Report
Domain-by-domain posture, severity-tiered findings, prioritized remediation, and an executive narrative — delivered within minutes of completion.
4
Act
Findings link to the controls they address, giving remediation teams a clear line from gap to obligation. Share with boards, auditors, or counsel as-is.
If you don't know the answers
That is the finding. A control nobody can describe isn't governed, and two participants who describe the same control differently means it is applied inconsistently — or nobody was trained. Our alignment analysis measures that divergence explicitly. You don't need to arrive with the answers; where you can't answer, we tell you what it means.
Framework-anchored assessments
Four Assessments. One Flat Price.
NIST AI RMF (Full), NIST AI RMF 600, EU AI Act, and ISO/IEC 42001 — all $9,000 flat. Read the full framework breakdowns, question counts, legal-status context, and sample report on the AI Readiness page.
Free resources
Take Something Useful Either Way
No form, no email required. Use them whether or not you ever engage us.
Reference guide
Top 10 AI Engine SWOT Analysis
Strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats across today’s leading AI platforms — so you know what you’re choosing before you standardize on it.
- ·Current as of March 2026
- ·Platform-by-platform comparison
Decision framework
Build vs. Buy vs. Partner
The most consequential AI decision you will make, structured as gates with evidence thresholds rather than a vendor bake-off.
- ·7 gate criteria with evidence thresholds
- ·Pre-populated geopolitical vendor risk matrix
- ·Facilitated assessment worksheet
Methodology
Assessment Methodology & Maturity Model
What each maturity level means, how questions are authored against named controls, and how findings and severity tiers are produced — the technical overview for anyone who has to defend the choice internally.
- ·Maturity scale with action signals
- ·Severity classifications and remediation tiers
- ·Framework coverage and defensibility
Sample deliverable
Sample Reports
Real assessment, fictional company. Choose from NIST AI RMF (Full), NIST AI RMF 600, EU AI Act, or ISO/IEC 42001 sample reports.
- ·All 10 domain scores + radar chart
- ·Findings by severity + executive narrative
- ·Full remediation register
Working documents · paid
Templates & calculators for the harder decisions
TOWS & use-case fit, AI risk matrix, analysis frameworks reference, Porter's Five Forces, TCO calculator, and vendor RFI/RFP scorecard. $333–$600 each — standalone, no assessment required.
Who you're hiring
Understanding From 25+ Years as a Cybersecurity and GRC Executive
Before founding Data Defenders, our principal spent more than 25 years as a cybersecurity and GRC executive — 19 of them as a CISO or BISO across payments, government, semiconductor, high-tech, healthcare, and financial services, and six as a Managing Director evaluating the security and GRC programs of organizations across nearly every industry vertical.
That cross-sector diagnostic perspective is rare. Most security leaders have depth in one or two sectors. The assessment platform is where two decades of that pattern recognition is encoded.
Also available
The Rest of the Practice
Fractional CISO
Executive security leadership sized to your organization — program strategy and oversight, board risk advisory, team leadership, third-party risk governance. Hourly, set from an initial consultation.
Learn more →Cybersecurity programs
Program development, audit support for SOC 2, ISO 27001, HIPAA and PCI DSS, enterprise GRC and data privacy, and BC/DR resilience. Hourly, scoped to program stage and deliverables.
Learn more →Find Out Which Direction
You're Headed
Fifteen questions, no signup, no account. Directional only — but if the direction is wrong, you'll want to know that before someone else points it out.
Available for domestic & international engagements
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AI Governance Assessments · Fractional CISO · Cybersecurity Programs · GRC