PlannedCompliance

Producing security evidence for audits

What auditors accept as evidence, and how to collect it without a six-week scramble.

LevelPractitioner
Material3 modules, 9 lessons
Reading time1 h 42 m
StatusPlanned — not open

This course is not available yet

It is planned and the outline below is a first draft, so it may yet change. There is no enrolment and no date — when it is ready it will be on this page.

If you need this capability now rather than later, Compliance workspace is the service that covers it, or talk to us.

Who it is for

The person who has been handed a SOC 2 or ISO 27001 project alongside their existing job, which is the usual arrangement.

Practitioner. For people who administer these systems day to day.

No prerequisites. Nothing is assumed beyond using a computer at work.

What you will be able to do

  • Explain the difference between a control, a policy and evidence of operation
  • Scope an assessment to the systems genuinely in it, and defend the boundary
  • Collect evidence as a by-product of operations rather than as a project
  • Recognise the findings that come up every time, and close them in advance

Outline

3 modules, 9 lessons, 1 h 42 m of material. The times are the sum of the lessons rather than a round figure.

01What is actually being assessed

Not your security. Whether your controls do what you said they do, consistently.

Controls, policies and evidence12 m

Three different things, and the one auditors ask for.

Type I against Type II, and the observation window10 m

Design against operation, and why the window shapes the whole project.

Scoping, and why it is the biggest lever12 m

Systems, data and people in scope, and the cost of a boundary drawn too wide.

02Evidence that is accepted

A screenshot with no date proves nothing, and that is the most common submission.

What makes a sample acceptable12 m

Completeness, population, dates, and the system of record.

Collecting continuously14 m

Making evidence fall out of the work instead of being reconstructed.

Exceptions, and writing them up10 m

A documented exception is a finding avoided.

03The findings that always come up

They are the same ones. Closing them in advance is cheaper than explaining them.

Access reviews and leavers12 m

The single most common finding, and the process that prevents it.

Change management that is not theatre10 m

Evidence of review, for teams too small to separate duties fully.

Vendor management10 m

The register, the reviews, and the subprocessors nobody listed.

Format. Written lessons with evidence templates. Delivery mechanism is not built yet.

Would you rather we just did it?

This course exists because the work behind it is work we do. If you need the result rather than the skill, compliance workspace is the service that covers it.