Skip to main content
Status: Stable Version: 1.0.0 Author: Rifteo Tags: security, risk, reporting
Installation
rifteo-skills add risk-assessor

Summary

Produce a structured, defensible risk assessment for any described vulnerability from likelihood and impact scoring through residual risk calculation and SLA-bound treatment recommendations.
  • Scores likelihood (1–3) using attack vector, exploit availability, authentication requirements, and active exploitation status with a hard override to High if actively exploited in the wild
  • Scores impact (1–3) across the CIA triad, accounting for scope change (lateral movement) and business system criticality
  • Calculates inherent and residual risk via a 3×3 matrix, then cross-checks against CVSS and explains any divergence
  • Outputs a complete risk report: attack surface, scores with justification, existing controls, residual risk, remediation SLA, treatment recommendation, and escalation triggers

SKILL.md file

Risk Assessor

Score a vulnerability’s likelihood and impact, calculate inherent and residual risk, and produce an SLA-bound treatment recommendation.

When to Use This Skill

Use this skill when the user:
  • Describes a vulnerability and wants to know how serious it is
  • Asks “what’s the risk level?” or “how urgent is this to fix?”
  • Has a CVSS score but wants it contextualized with compensating controls and business impact
  • Needs to assign a remediation SLA (24h / 7 days / 30 days / next cycle) to a finding
  • Wants to document risk treatment (mitigate, accept, transfer, avoid) with justification

What Does It Check?

The skill applies a likelihood × impact matrix informed by real environmental context compensating controls, business criticality, and actual threat intelligence rather than relying solely on CVSS. The final residual risk score accounts for existing controls and drives the remediation SLA. If CVSS and the matrix diverge by more than one level, the skill explains why and the matrix score takes precedence for production decisions.In scope:
  • Any described vulnerability with enough context to determine attack vector, authentication requirements, and data in scope
  • CVSS v3.x correlation when a score is provided
  • Chained vulnerabilities (scored as the combined attack chain, not individually)
  • Escalation triggers: active exploitation, regulatory data in scope, lateral movement possibility
Out of scope:
  • Producing CVSS vectors from scratch use finding-writer which runs cvss-scorer.py
  • Compliance gap analysis use compliance-gap-analyzer for that

How It Works

Step 1: Gather ContextConfirm affected component, network exposure, authentication required, exploit availability, data in scope, existing controls, and CVSS score if available.Step 2: Score Likelihood (1–3)Base score from attacker capability and exposure. Apply modifiers: +0.5 for network attack vector, +0.5 for no authentication, −0.5 for physical access only, −0.5 for user interaction required, +0.5 if no patch available. Override to 3 if actively exploited in the wild.Step 3: Score Impact (1–3)Evaluate Confidentiality, Integrity, and Availability independently (0–3 each). Take the highest axis as the overall impact. Apply +0.5 for changed scope (lateral movement possible) and ±0.5 for business criticality.Step 4: Risk MatrixMultiply Likelihood × Impact. Thresholds: 1–2 = Low, 3–4 = Medium, 6 = High, 9 = Critical.Step 5: CVSS CorrelationIf a CVSS score is provided, map it to a level and compare. Divergences of more than one level are flagged and explained.Step 6: Residual RiskRecalculate explicitly after applying existing controls. Never assume controls are 100% effective.

Output

Residual RiskRemediation SLA
CriticalEscalate within 24h; patch or mitigate within 48h
HighRemediate within 7 days; notify security lead
MediumRemediate within 30 days
LowSchedule in next maintenance cycle
Example output structure:
Vulnerability: SQL injection in /api/search internet-facing endpoint

Attack Surface: Internet-facing REST API, unauthenticated, no WAF

Likelihood: High Score: 3
Impact: High Score: 3
 Confidentiality: High (3) full database read possible
 Integrity: High (3) arbitrary write/delete
 Availability: Medium (2) service disruption possible
 Dominant axis: C

Inherent Risk: 9 → Critical

CVSS Correlation: 9.8 (Critical) | Aligned

Existing Controls:
 - Read replica DB: reduces availability impact slightly

Residual Risk: Critical

Remediation SLA: Escalate within 24h; patch within 48h
Recommended Treatment: Mitigate parameterize all queries immediately

Escalation Triggers:
 [YES] Regulatory data confirmed in scope (PII)
 [YES] Actively exploited class

Known Limitations

  • Accept treatment is only valid for Low residual risk the skill will not recommend Accept for Medium, High, or Critical
  • Chained vulnerabilities must be described together the chain score governs, not individual scores
  • Requires enough context to infer likelihood factors; if critical inputs are missing, the skill asks before scoring

Benchmark Results

Tested on claude-sonnet-4-6 via Claude Code CLI. Same prompt, same model, same target. The only variable is whether the skill is loaded.
MetricWithout SkillWith Skill
Turns to complete21
Response tokens~4,629~2,009
Total time101s68s

finding-writer

Convert raw pentest notes into structured audit findings ready for reporting

compliance-gap-analyzer

Aggregate findings into a gap report across ISO 27001, NIST CSF, PCI-DSS, and OWASP

control-lookup

Look up any control ID and map it across ISO 27001, NIST CSF, PCI-DSS, and OWASP