Microsoft SCM is a centralized security and compliance policy manager product from Microsoft. It is a standalone application. Microsoft develops these baselines and best practice recommendations based on customer feedback and other agency's recommendations—I have mentioned a few of these in Chapter 1, Operating System and Baseline Security. These polices are consistently reviewed and updated. So, it is important that you are using the latest policy baseline. If there is a new policy, you will be able to download and update the baseline from the Microsoft SCM console itself. Since Microsoft SCM supports multiple input and output formats such as XML, Group Policy Objects (GPO), Desired Configuration Management (DCM), Security Content Automation Protocol (SCAP), and so on, it can be a centralized platform for your network infrastructure and other security and compliance products. It is also possible to integrate SCM with Microsoft System Center 2012 Process Pack for IT GRC. More...