Proving Compliance: Why SOC 2 Evidence Collection Matters

Years ago, collecting evidence was a walk in the park. But we can’t say the same now as most of the data is stored on the cloud.

Not to mention the tedious effort involved; almost all application is constantly exposed to risk consistently. A need to secure sensitive information and demonstrate it to present a trustless posture is the need of the hour. And, this is where SOC 2 (Service Organization Control) evidence collection shines.

If you are in the process of getting ready for your SOC 2 audit and want to get the attestation as soon as possible, you need to understand the importance of SOC 2 evidence collection first.

In this article, let’s dive into what it is and how you can automate it for optimal results!

Read on…

What is SOC 2 evidence collection?

SOC 2 evidence collection refers to the SOC 2 report that documents the results of your auditor’s examination of how accurate your system’s description is. It is a continuous process of collecting evidence to show that you comply with the framework. The report is mainly for an analytical review of how your company is demonstrating compliance.

The key goal of an audit is to confirm your organization’s controls, processes, and configurations are as you say they are.

For example, suppose you claim that your backup control involves taking a daily image of the production environment and uploading it as a backup. In that case, the evidence should show that this is indeed happening.

In some cases, people might confuse this backup control with another required control called the audit trail backup control in SOC 2.

Now, let’s understand the importance of SOC 2 evidence collection…

Importance of SOC 2 evidence collection

SOC 2 evidence collection helps gather evidence in one place to meet the compliance requirements and shows a clear picture of your commitment to security.

And, scattered evidence frustrates auditors and your team to no end. So, create a central repository for evidence and supporting materials. It makes the information you need easily accessible, serves as strong proof of your security adherence, and helps sustain a great security posture.

You will also be able to avoid last-minute rushes and stress by collecting evidence throughout the compliance audit period.

What kind of evidence is requested during a SOC 2 audit?

Auditors typically request various evidence to assess an organization’s controls and compliance with the TSC. The specific evidence requested may vary depending on the nature of the audit.

Here is the SOC 2 evidence you must submit during a SOC 2 audit. We have grouped the evidence into 8 main groups:

1. Terminated employees

Former employees, especially those who may have been terminated under contentious circumstances, may have a motive to harm the company, its reputation, or its data. Hence, to prove you have taken proper measures, here is what you need to provide as evidence.

• Access removal requests
• User lists showing accounts removed/disabled

2. Risk management

Cyber security requires money, time, and personnel are very finite. This is why you need to demonstrate that you do, in fact, have risk management in place to tackle unnecessary problems that may surprise you. With that being said, here is what you need to show:

• Completed risk or security assessments
• Disaster Recovery testing
• Vulnerability scans and third-party penetration testing reports
• Remediation plans for identified risks

3. New hires

New employees are often not yet familiar with your company’s security policies, procedures, and best practices. They may inadvertently engage in actions that could compromise security, such as falling for phishing emails, using weak passwords, or mishandling sensitive data.

To avoid this, here is what you need to be prepared with:

• Background checks on new employees
• Confirmation on whether there is an employee handbook acknowledgment
• System access requests to avoid security issues
• System access approvals

4. Logical security

This helps you safeguard your digital systems, infra and your data from unauthorized access or manipulation. To demonstrate compliance, you need to showcase you have the below-mentioned evidence: 

• Role-based access
• Super-user/Administrator access is restricted appropriately
• Data at Rest encryption
• Minimum password requirements
• Anti-virus
• Patching
• Unsubscribe and opt-out policies
• Confidentiality policy and agreements
• Data retention and destruction policies

5. Governance

Many industries and regions have specific regulations and legal requirements related to cybersecurity. It helps provide the structure for developing, implementing, and enforcing cybersecurity policies and procedures.

• Information security governance structure
• Annual policy review
• Confirm those charged with infosec governance are formally communicated Information about infosec
• Annual security awareness training for all your employees and not just the security team
• Self-assessment questionnaires
• Penetration testing results

6. Incident response

Cyberattacks can happen at any time, and their impact can be severe. Incident response allows organizations to respond swiftly to contain and mitigate the impact of a security incident, minimizing potential damage and data loss. Hence, this is what you need to show:

• Incident response plan/procedures
• How anomalous activity indicative of security incidents are detected and addressed
• Incident response plan tabletop exercise

7. Change management

Changes to software, hardware, or system configurations can introduce new Change management processes to ensure that potential security implications are assessed, and mitigations are put in place before changes are implemented.

• Code reviews and testing documentation
• How segregation of duties is maintained
• Emergency change process

8. Vendor management

Many organizations rely on third-party vendors, suppliers, and service providers. These external entities often have access to an organization’s systems or data. Effective vendor management ensures that these third parties meet specific security standards and do not introduce security vulnerabilities

• Vendor inventory
• Vendor risk classification
• Formal review of vendors’ SOC 2 reports

A better way to manage evidence management

Manually collecting all the evidence is a thing of the past. SOC 2 auditors are now relying on powerful compliance automation software to see all the evidence in one place. That said, 

Now, let’s explore what the best way to manage evidence management is:

1. Choose the right software

Move away from manual evidence collection and opt for compliance operations software to streamline the process. Look for software that can handle multiple assurance frameworks and crosswalk controls. This helps you manage encryption policies, procedures, and technical solutions efficiently.

How can Sprinto help?

Sprinto is a compliance automation platform with an easy-to-use dashboard that allows you to check all the controls and automate evidence collection. More on this in the next section.

2. The software should be able to assign owners

Choose a tool that lets you assign specific individuals or teams the responsibility for managing controls and gathering evidence.

The best tool should also enable you to establish review schedules for controls and various types of evidence, whether weekly, monthly, quarterly, or annual. You can set due dates within the system, eliminating the need for manual reminders.

Gathering evidence shouldn’t be a last-minute rush just before an audit. If an auditor discovers missing or incorrect evidence during the audit, it can result in a negative readiness assessment, which you want to avoid.

3. Get automatic alerts for remediation

Automatic alerts are a lifesaver. And you should look for a tool that offers this. Basically, what this feature does is it sends automated alerts and escalations for incomplete evidence collection or remediation tasks. It also ensures that your evidence remains up-to-date and meets your auditor’s requirements.

For example, with Sprinto, if you’ve assigned an admin the task of implementing a new policy, it will automatically remind them of their responsibilities by sending notifications and speeding up your compliance journey.

And, if the work is done after the requested deadline, Sprinto will escalate the alert to you and the supervisor of the responsible person. Now, isn’t that convenient for a security program?

4. Has automated evidence collection

Evidence takes various forms, like policies related to trust services criteria (e.g., security, privacy policy, access controls, business continuity, or other audit requirements) or snapshots capturing specific system or process activity moments.

This is especially useful to meet auditor standards. However, the evidence of compliance you collect must be “fresh,” meaning it has to be regular for your audit report.

What we mean by fresh evidence here is that:

• Employees completing their security training
• Involve backup settings for cloud databases and safeguard from unauthorized access
• Encryption configurations for high-risk data processing apps
• Lists of users and access groups for cloud databases
• Code change management details

This information often comes from cloud services like AWS, Azure, GitHub, and Google Cloud, which you can easily integrate with Sprinto.

When your compliance management system can automatically collect this type of evidence, it helps reduce the burden of assessments. And this is useful for the external auditor from a licensed CPA firm as they can see it all in one dashboard instead of 100s of documents opened in different tabs.

How can Sprinto automate your SOC 2 evidence collection?

Sprinto simplifies your SOC 2 evidence collection through automation. Manual collection involves repetitive tasks, Excel sheets, screenshots, and potential errors. Sprinto streamlines this process, freeing up your engineering staff for vital tasks.

Here’s how Sprinto’s automation works:

• Ensures real-time and audit-friendly evidence collection for corrective actions
• Maps evidence to each control or requirement
• The dashboard allows you to revisit evidence at any time to meet regulatory requirements
• All evidence is in verifiable format and easy to download
• The audit dashboard enables seamless collaboration with third-party auditors, providing easy access to evidence. It also offers a shareable link to update key stakeholders on compliance status

Sprinto makes SOC 2 evidence collection efficient and error-free while you go ahead for an audit with a licensed CPA firm.

Curious now? Book a call with our SOC 2 experts to learn more about managing evidence collection with Sprinto!

FAQs

1. Which SOC 2 type is recommended to go first and why?

If your organization has a deal in the pipeline and needs to move it forward quickly, go with Type 1. On the other hand, if there’s scope for a more detailed audit posture, Type 2 offers your company the highest level of security practices or security posture.

2. What if we are unable to pass all due checks on time? Will that have an impact on my SOC2 report or get flagged?

You won’t face any issues if you promptly resolve any security concerns or alerts Sprinto sends on your security controls for a period of time. Auditors typically only penalize if you address the critical checks before the audit process.

3. What happens when the information is exchanged through the physical documents?

If this is the case, the suggestion is to store all data in the cloud or on drives. Yet, if you have important documents in your office, they should have extra on-premise security measures. Sprinto will include them as monitored checks and provide manual evidence to support them during the audit process.

4. Can you use automation for SOC 2 evidence collection?

You can easily automate SOC 2 evidence collection with compliance software tools like Sprinto. This way, you can save 100s of man hours, otherwise spent on manual efforts.