Take the Friction Out of Fax with Instant InfoSystems

FedRAMP (Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program) is the standardized process the U.S. federal government uses to assess and authorize cloud service providers to handle federal data. Any cloud fax service used by a federal agency to transmit government data generally needs a FedRAMP authorization at the appropriate impact level — Low, Moderate, or High. State and local agencies are not legally required to use FedRAMP-authorized services, but many adopt it as a security baseline or have their own state-level authorization programs such as StateRAMP.

FISMA (Federal Information Security Management Act) requires every federal system to receive its own security authorization from each agency it serves. FedRAMP is a streamlined version built specifically for cloud services: a single FedRAMP authorization lets a provider work with multiple federal agencies instead of duplicating the same review for each. Both frameworks are built on the same NIST 800-53 security controls — FedRAMP just makes cloud adoption faster for agencies.

No — despite common vendor marketing claims, there is no official CJIS certification for fax or any other software product. The FBI's CJIS Security Policy sets requirements across 13 policy areas including encryption (AES-256), access control, audit logging, personnel background screening, and incident response — but the FBI audits criminal justice agencies, not vendors. Agencies remain ultimately responsible for confirming that any fax or cloud service they use satisfies CJIS requirements.

CJIS requires safeguards across multiple policy areas: data encryption (AES-256 at rest, TLS 1.2+ in transit), strict access controls and multi-factor authentication, complete audit logging, physical security at data centers, personnel background screening, and documented incident response procedures. A fax or cloud service handling Criminal Justice Information — biometric, case history, or identity data — must satisfy all applicable policy areas, not encryption alone.

Fax remains in active use across federal, state, and local government for FOIA requests, court filings, law enforcement records exchange, veterans' benefits documentation, and healthcare records within government health systems — largely because fax is treated as a secure, legally recognized transmission method under existing regulations that predate more modern alternatives. Digital cloud fax lets agencies keep that legal familiarity while replacing physical infrastructure with encrypted, auditable, internet-based transmission.

FedRAMP authorization is a federal government requirement, not a blanket legal mandate for state and local agencies. However, many state and local governments adopt FedRAMP as their own security baseline — or have separate programs like StateRAMP — especially for systems handling sensitive health or criminal justice data. Agencies should confirm their jurisdiction's specific procurement and security requirements rather than assuming a commercial-grade service is automatically sufficient.