ISO 27001 checklist: a step-by-step guide to implementation
As cyberattacks and data breach risks increase, businesses are pressed to seek solutions. An effective cybersecurity strategy should combine countermeasures against both external attacks and internal risks.
The International Standards Organization (ISO) and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) have developed the ISO 27001 standard. This standard provides a framework for an organization's Information Security Management System (ISMS), describing approaches to IT security and privacy.
It's also possible to obtain an ISO 27001 certificate, confirming that your organization's ISMS aligns with the best IT security practices. However, achieving this certification is no small feat—it requires many hours of work for accreditation.
For this reason, we have prepared the following guide to assist you in navigating ISO 27001 compliance.
ISO 27001 checklist summary
The ISO 27001 standard provides a framework for establishing, implementing, maintaining, and continually improving ISMS. It outlines a risk management process involving people, processes, and IT systems. The main ISO 27001 checklist steps include:
- Appoint an ISO 27001 team
- Build your ISMS
- Define the risk assessment methodology
- Conduct a risk assessment
- Write the Statement of Applicability
- Create a Risk Treatment Plan
- Define how to measure the effectiveness of controls
- Implement access controls & procedures
- Implement training & awareness programmes
- Assemble required documents and records
- Monitor the ISMS
- Conduct internal audit
- Management review
- Corrective and preventive actions
In essence, ISO 27001 helps to systematically manage sensitive information, ensuring its confidentiality, integrity, and availability. The accompanying checklist is a practical tool, providing guidelines on how these objectives can be achieved in practice.
Who needs ISO 27001?
ISO 27001 provides a framework for building ISMSs, so it’s a completely different approach than HIPAA or GDPR. An organization becomes compliant if its ISMS follows the criteria established by ISO 27001. However, it isn’t a requirement that any law would enforce.
Many organizations voluntarily seek ISO 27001 compliance as it’s considered a mark of trust. Clients and other businesses regard organizations with ISO 27001 certification as more secure. This can mean that it will be easier to convince others to enter partnerships or sell your product and services.
In addition, it’s a helpful framework for improving your organization’s cybersecurity. Thoroughly following ISO 27001 guidelines can reduce critical risks and mitigate potential damage, making an organization more resistant.
The standard isn’t mutually exclusive to other regulations like HIPAA or GDPR. In practice, steps taken toward ISO 27001 compliance often aid in meeting the requirements of other mandated regulations.
ISO 27001 checklist: steps to implementation
ISO 27001 accreditation is a lengthy and demanding process. While smaller organizations might achieve it more quickly, larger ones typically require more time to become certified.
To stay focused during this journey, here's an ISO 27001 checklist.
1. Appoint an ISO 27001 team
The first step in ISO 27001 accreditation is to assemble a team responsible for ISMS implementation. Naturally, you’re going to need a leader to drive the project.
As with any initiative, the team should devise a project mandate plan detailing information security objectives, timeframes, and costs. This document will be useful when evaluating the progress made and detailing what still needs to be done.
2. Build your ISMS
A crucial early step in ISO 27001 accreditation is to build your internal ISMS. It should be extensive and define the organization’s expectations for employees when handling sensitive data and dealing with IT systems. The plan should also outline what should be done if the expectations aren’t met.
A good piece of advice is to abstain from copy-pasting pre-made ISMS from other organizations. Your ISMS will be the most effective if it’s tailor-made to align with your company’s business case. It’s a good opportunity to consider what particular risks your organization faces and what can be done to better protect against them.
In addition, the policy should cover internal procedures. Employees should be aware of existing security practices and understand why they’re needed. The company’s approach should also be detailed in ISMS so that every organization member is on the same page regarding cybersecurity.
3. Define the risk assessment methodology
Risk assessment methodology should be regarded as one of the key priorities in your ISO 27001 checklist. It’s a systemic approach to understanding various risks, potential impacts, and likelihoods. This step shapes what the security model will focus on most.
The route to risk assessment will begin with identifying what assets need to be kept safe. Based on their scope, protection objectives should be established, placing your resources and assets within some hierarchy of importance. After that’s done, it’s necessary to look into specific vulnerabilities that could be leveraged to access sensitive data. This should help you get an action plan to improve your compliance and increase your organization’s security.
4. Conduct a risk assessment
A risk assessment executes the plan that you outlined in step #3. Based on your considerations of what risks might interfere with a company’s objectives, you’ll need to determine their likelihood. It might be an option to rely on cybersecurity statistics, your company’s exposure, market presence, and security setup.
Not all risks are identical in severity. Probability and impact are critical factors in determining their danger. You’ll also need to assess tolerance for each identified risk.
This step should end with a risk assessment report documenting all the steps taken during the risk assessment process. This is a central piece of your ISMS security policies.
5. Write the Statement of Applicability
The Statement of Applicability details your organization’s system security scope. List all security controls, highlighting those that apply to your case. The document also explains approach justifications and describes the implementation plan.
The document also contains softer information like organizational profile, design principles, supplier selection principles, and employees’ roles and responsibilities. This ties into the implementation of unified SoA requirements within a unified framework.
6. Create a Risk Treatment Plan
The Risk Treatment Plan is closely tied to the SoA plan and details how its controls could be implemented in your organization. The plan should be based on your organization’s IT assets and the identified risks.
It will be used to coordinate further steps of ISO 27001 compliance.
7. Define how to measure the effectiveness of controls
Following the Risk Treatment Plan, you should also add some basis of evaluation for your implemented controls. This is a diagnostic measure that will help you identify areas in which your ISMS might be lacking. Since ISMS includes policies, processes, and controls, this should lead you into a wide-scope measurement system.
Clear evaluation guidelines could also benefit other metrics, such as security effectiveness and efficiency. All stakeholders will greatly benefit from this data when making decisions. Ensure that your objectives are realistic and fit within a set timeframe.
8. Implement access controls & procedures
All previously completed steps form a core of your ISMS, which means you can begin using it. This will require some overhaul within your company regarding the IT security approach.
Depending on the extent of your risks and the potential solutions you’ve outlined, you may spend a good amount of time on this step. This step already contributes a great deal to your organization’s cybersecurity.
9. Implement training & awareness programs
After ISMS is established, your employees should be aware of the new changes. ISO 27001 compliance also entails higher expectations from your employees to ensure that the company is safe from cyber threats. Therefore, all employees should be in the loop regarding your newly adopted cybersecurity practices. Cybersecurity awareness training would be a go-to solution.
Human error is one of the most frequent causes of data breaches, so overlooking your employees' cyber awareness can have drastic consequences. Social engineering and phishing campaigns exploit the lack of cybersecurity awareness. Therefore, it’s a must to include it in your ISMS.
10. Assemble required documents and records
Record management will directly contribute to your ISO 27001 compliance progress. Being certified will entail the requirement of proof of procedures and instructions applied in practice. It will be an undeniable example that your ISMS works in practice and not only on paper.
In addition, clear and concise records will help you monitor everything transpiring within your company’s walls. It’s a goldmine of useful data that, when examined, could help you to identify critical areas that still need improvement.
11. Monitor the ISMS
Depending on specific identified risks within your organization, you should create a mechanism for monitoring them. Monitoring provides an additional precautionary measure against various risks, vulnerabilities, and other threats.
This step also marks the coming together of your controls objectives and methodology approach. Monitoring lets you verify whether your results confirm that your objectives are reached. If they aren’t, you’ll have to perform corrective or preventive actions to amend the situation.
12. Conduct an internal audit
Internal audits can have numerous benefits for your organization. They highlight areas that need improvement and give insight into whether your ISMS is still relevant. If the two have little in common, they provide insight into what could be adjusted to better address your business problems.
If possible, an internal audit should be performed without the involvement of those responsible for ISMS implementation. This will help keep it objective, and shortcomings won’t be swept under the rug. Remember that the bigger the scope of your organization’s ISMS, the longer your audit will be.
Finally, the audit should be done periodically. It would be best to conduct an internal audit once every year or, at the very least, once every three years (you should also consider doing an external audit). An audit is an important part of your ISMS diagnostics and helps identify underlying problems that need to be solved.
13. Management review
Having your executive team on board with the ISMS is crucial. While it’s not essential to explain to them how every tiny detail works, a broad understanding of ISMS's strengths and weaknesses is something that benefits everyone. Sharing its status updates regularly means keeping everyone on the same page.
In the end, management will have the final say regarding security budget approvals and aligning business strategies.
14. Corrective and preventive actions
Following internal audits, you should have a comprehensive overview of your ISMS. The implementation team should then focus on making continuous improvements to ISMS to solve the issues that have been found.
It’s also important to treat the found problems as symptoms and focus on the underlying root cause. Continuous improvements to ISMS prevent it from becoming obsolete and resolve all non-conformities to the document within the organization.
Useful tips for ISO 27001 implementation
Implementing ISO 27001 can be transformative for international organizations aiming to secure their assets. However, the process can present multiple challenges during implementation. Here are some effective tips to navigate this process.
- Take your time to understand ISO 27001 requirements. ISO 27001 isn’t just about ticking the boxes to align with the requirements. It can be a transformative step to rethink how the current IT processes could be made more effective.
- Secure top management’s commitment. The support of key decision-makers will be crucial to make sure that the process runs smoothly. It will be crucial to set the tone for the importance of information security and drive the initiative throughout the organization.
- Clearly define your ISMS. Determine which departments, locations, and assets are included. A well-defined scope ensures focused efforts and effective management of resources.
- Conduct a comprehensive risk assessment. Identify potential threats and vulnerabilities to your information assets and assess their potential impact. This forms the backbone of your ISMS.
- Seek expert advice. Don’t hesitate to seek external expertise. Consultants with experience in implementing ISO 27001 can provide invaluable insights and guidance.
By following the provided pointers, organizations can lay a strong foundation for implementing ISO 27001, enhancing their information security posture, and demonstrating their commitment to data security.
What to look for in ISO 27001 implementation tools?
Numerous ISO 27001 implementation toolkits include various templates and resources to help your organization’s transition. The important thing to remember is that the toolkit will only function as a supplement to help you on your compliance journey. However, you’ll still need to filter it through your organization’s specifics.
As for the implementation itself, most changes will affect your approach to cybersecurity. The majority of time will be spent educating employees and breaking harmful cybersecurity habits. Arguably, no tool would be useful in such scenarios.
Conclusion
Implementing ISO 27001 compliance solutions is a strategic choice that empowers organizations to fortify their information security. While this is a challenging journey, it offers significant rewards in terms of data protection. The key lies in embracing the standard not merely as a compliance requirement but as a holistic approach to managing information security.
With dedicated effort in understanding the standard, securing management buy-in, defining scope, assessing risks, and developing relevant policies, organizations can build a robust ISMS. The emphasis on continuous employee training, regular audits, effective security incidents management, and continual improvement reflects a commitment to evolving security needs.
Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and not legal advice. Use it at your own risk and consider consulting a licensed professional for legal matters. Content may not be up-to-date or applicable to your jurisdiction and is subject to change without notice.