This is a complement, not a replacement. We recommend keeping Microsoft Secure Score running. 365 Security Assessment layers deeper coverage on top of it — they are designed to work together.

Complement — Go Deeper Than the Baseline

Secure Score checks ~200 settings. We check 24,000+ rules.

Microsoft's free baseline meets the Microsoft expert audit. Free 14-day trial.

24,000+
Deeper rules beyond Secure Score
10
Compliance frameworks Secure Score doesn't map
MSP
Cross-tenant console Secure Score lacks
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Read-only access only. Does not affect your Secure Score.

How They Fit Together

Microsoft Secure Score

Free, built-in baseline

  • Microsoft's own recommended actions
  • Continuously updated by Microsoft
  • Benchmarking against similar orgs
  • Free with qualifying M365 license

365 Security Assessment

Layers deeper on top

  • 24,000+ rules beyond the Microsoft baseline
  • 10 compliance frameworks with per-control evidence
  • Cross-tenant MSP console
  • Audit-grade executive and technical reports

Use Secure Score for your daily Microsoft baseline. Use 365SA when your auditor, GRC team, or compliance program needs depth and evidence Secure Score doesn't produce.

At-a-Glance Verdict

Where Secure Score ends and 365SA takes over.

Capability
365 Security Assessment
Microsoft Secure Score
Coverage
M365 rule depth (Exchange, Teams, SharePoint, Intune, Entra) 24,000+ rules Microsoft baseline actions only
Azure resource posture
Exchange Online depth
Depth
MITRE ATT&CK mapping at the per-finding level
Compliance frameworks with per-control evidence 10 (HIPAA, GDPR, SOC2, FedRAMP…)
Audit-grade evidence export
Workflow
MSP multi-tenant cross-tenant view
Executive + technical reporting for leadership & auditors
Continuous monitoring & drift detection
Pricing
Cost Free tier + from $997/mo Free with M365 license
Full support Partial Not available Based on publicly available product information.

What 365SA Adds on Top

These three capabilities are what security leaders reach for when Secure Score alone isn't enough for auditors, GRC, or enterprise scale.

Start Where Secure Score Stops

Secure Score surfaces Microsoft's own recommended actions — roughly 100–150 controls depending on your licenses. 365SA inspects the same workloads at the individual policy, user, and configuration level — producing findings Secure Score was never designed to surface.

  • Individual transport rules, per-mailbox settings, per-connector configurations
  • Teams channel-level and guest access policies — not just top-level toggles
  • Intune compliance policy gaps — per-platform, per-compliance profile
~150
Secure Score recommended actions (Microsoft's baseline)
24,000+
365SA rules — the depth beneath the baseline

Secure Score for compliance

Secure Score is a posture metric — a percentage based on enabled controls. It is not designed to produce per-control evidence for HIPAA, SOC2, GDPR, FedRAMP, HITRUST, NIST 800-53, ISO 27001, CMMC, CIS M365, or PCI-DSS. Those deliverables require a separate tool.

365SA compliance evidence

Every scan produces per-control evidence across all 10 frameworks simultaneously. One assessment = one deliverable set your auditor can actually use.

Audit-Grade Compliance Reporting

Secure Score is a posture metric, not a compliance deliverable. 365SA generates per-control evidence across 10 major frameworks so the same scan that drives remediation also stands up in front of an auditor.

  • HIPAA, GDPR, SOC2, FedRAMP, HITRUST, NIST 800-53, CIS M365, ISO 27001, CMMC, PCI-DSS
  • Per-control pass/fail tied to actual tenant configuration
  • Executive summary and detailed technical report — one scan, two audiences

Built for Partners Managing Many Tenants

MSPs and consultants can run 365SA across dozens of customer tenants from one console with consistent scoring. Secure Score requires logging into each tenant individually with no cross-tenant view, making it impractical at scale for managed service providers.

  • Cross-tenant security posture comparison in one dashboard
  • Consistent scoring methodology across all customers
  • Per-customer compliance reports for client delivery

Secure Score for MSPs

Each customer tenant has its own Secure Score. There is no cross-tenant console. An MSP managing 50 customers must log into each tenant individually and manually aggregate results. Secure Score is designed for single-tenant operators, not managed service providers.

365SA for MSPs

One console. All customers. Consistent scoring across every tenant. Per-customer compliance reports delivered as standard output — not a custom engagement.

10 Compliance Frameworks — Mapped on Every Scan

GDPR FedRAMP HITRUST NIST 800-53 CIS M365 SOC 2 ISO 27001 CMMC HIPAA PCI-DSS
Built by Bonelli Systems, 4× Microsoft Solutions Partner

Common Questions

If Secure Score is free, why pay for 365 Security Assessment?
Secure Score is the right starting point, and we recommend customers keep using it. 365SA layers on the deeper M365 and Azure audit, MITRE ATT&CK mapping, and 10-framework compliance evidence Microsoft does not provide natively. The question isn't whether to use Secure Score — it's whether Secure Score alone is sufficient for your auditor, GRC team, or compliance requirements. For most enterprise and regulated organizations, it isn't.
Will 365SA conflict with Secure Score?
No. 365SA reads tenant configuration via Microsoft Graph in a fully read-only way and does not change any settings. Your Secure Score continues to update as your team remediates findings through the normal Microsoft Defender and admin center workflows. The two systems are fully independent.
Does 365SA replace the Defender portal?
No. The Defender portal is your operational SOC tool for day-to-day threat detection and response. 365SA is your assessment, audit, and reporting layer — built for security leadership, GRC, and external auditors rather than day-to-day SOC triage. They serve different personas and different workflows.

Go Deeper Than Your Baseline

Keep Secure Score running. Add 365SA for the compliance evidence, MITRE mapping, and MSP console that Microsoft doesn't provide natively.

Start Free 14-Day Trial

Free tier available. Does not affect Secure Score. No changes to your tenant.

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