alternative sources of support
163686·updated Oct 5, 2026No definition recorded.
Composition
Source
Alternative sources of support address the need to provide continued support for system components that are no longer supported by the original manufacturers, developers, or vendors when such components remain essential to organizational missions and business functions. If necessary, organizations can establish in-house support by developing customized patches for critical software components or obtain the services of external service providers who provide ongoing support for unsupported components through contractual relationships. Such contractual relationships can include open-source software value-added vendors. The increased risk of using unsupported system components can be mitigated by prohibiting the connection of such components to public or uncontrolled networks or implementing other forms of isolation.the sentence this term was read in
generalized from a web lookup of the quoted expression, with 1 reviewed place(s) it is used as the term Verdict: term of art.
- SA-22: Unsupported System Components - CSF Tools
- 03.16.02: Unsupported System Components - CSF Tools
- SA-22(1): Alternative Sources For Continued Support - CSF Tools
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A risk-management mechanism — either in-house or contracted externally — by which an organization maintains patches, updates, maintenance, and technical assistance for system components whose original vendor, developer, or manufacturer has ceased providing support. It is distinguished from ordinary vendor support by the fact that the original support chain has ended: the organization must actively procure or develop a substitute, such as custom patch development, third-party extended-support contracts, or open-source value-added provider arrangements. In practice the field invokes the concept specifically under controls governing unsupported or end-of-life system components that cannot be immediately replaced because they remain essential to mission or business operations — requiring documented organizational decisions about acceptable risk alongside the chosen support mechanism.
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Proposed during multiword review of this document in the CKI mapping queue.
Attested in
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