ISO 27002:2022, Control 5.3 – Segregation of Duties

ISO 27002:2022 Revised Controls

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ISO 27002:2022 control 5.3 — Segregation of Duties, formerly known as control 6.1.2 in ISO 27002:2013 defines the system by which conflicting duties and conflicting areas of responsibility are separated.

What is Control 5.3 Segregation of Duties?

Conflicting Duties and Areas of Responsibilities Explained

Every organisation has a set of policies and procedures (P&Ps) that govern its internal workings. P&Ps are supposed to be documented, but often they’re not.

If these P&Ps are not clear or well-communicated, the result is confusion among employees about their areas of responsibilities. This can get even worse when employees have overlapping responsibilities, or conflicting areas of responsibility.

Conflicts can occur when two or more employees have similar or different responsibilities towards a particular task. When this happens, the employees may end up doing the same thing twice, or doing different things that cancel out each other’s efforts. This wastes corporate resources and reduces productivity, which affects both the company’s bottom line and morale.

In order to make sure that your organisation does not suffer from this problem, it is important to understand what conflicting areas of responsibilities are, why they happen and how you can prevent them from occurring in your organisation. For the most part, this means separating duties so that different people handle different roles in the organisation.

Attributes Table

Controls are classified according to their attributes. Attributes help you align your control selection with industry standards and language. In control 5.3 these are:

Control TypeInformation Security PropertiesCybersecurity ConceptsOperational CapabilitiesSecurity Domains
#Preventive#Confidentiality #Integrity #Availability#Protect#Governance #Identity and access management#Governance and Ecosystem

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What Is The Purpose of Control 5.3?

The purpose of control 5.3 Segregation of Duties in ISO 27002 is to reduce the risk of fraud, error and bypassing of information security controls by ensuring that conflicting duties are separated.

Control 5.3 Explained

Control 5.3 covers the implementation guidance for segregation tasks and duties in an organisation in line with the framework of ISO 27001.

The principle involves breaking down key tasks into subtasks and assigning them to different people. This creates a system of checks and balances that can reduce the risk of errors or fraud.

The control is designed to prevent a single person from being able to commit, conceal and justify improper actions, thus decreasing the risk of fraud or error. It also prevents a single person from being able to override information security controls.

If one employee has all rights required for a particular task then there is a higher risk of fraud or error since one person can do everything without any checks and balances. However if no single person has all access rights required for a particular task, this reduces the risk that an employee can cause significant harm or financial loss.

What Is Involved and How to Meet the Requirements

Duties and areas of responsibilities that are not segregated could lead to fraud, misuse, inappropriate access and other security incidents.

In addition, segregation of duties is needed to mitigate the risks associated with the potential for collusion between individuals. These risks are increased when there are insufficient controls to prevent or detect collusion.

In order to meet the requirements for control 5.3 in ISO 27002:2022, the organisation should determine which duties and areas of responsibility need to be segregated and actionable segregation controls put in place.

Where such controls are not possible, particularly for small organisations with minimal staff strength, activities monitoring, audit trails and management supervision can be used. For larger organisations, automated tools can be used to identify and segregate roles so that conflicting roles are not assigned to people.

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Differences Between ISO 27002:2013 and ISO 27002:2022

The control number 5.3 Segregation of Duties in ISO 27002:2022 is not a new control. It is simply an improved version of control 6.1.2 Segregation of duties found in ISO 27002:2013.

The basics of Segregation of duties is the same in both control 5.3 ISO 27002:2022 and control 6.1.2 ISO 27002:2013. However, the new version describes a set of activities that require segregation when implementing this control.

These activities are:

a) initiating, approving and executing a change;

b) requesting, approving and implementing access rights;

c) designing, implementing and reviewing code;

d) developing software and administering production systems;

e) using and administering applications;

f) using applications and administering databases;

g) designing, auditing and assuring information security controls.

Who Is In Charge Of This Process?

There are multiple people who are responsible for segregation of duties in ISO 27002. First, a senior member of the management team should be involved to make sure that the initial risk assessment has been completed.

Then the processes that cover different parts of the organisation should be allocated to different groups of qualified employees. To prevent rogue employees from undermining company security this is usually done by assigning tasks to different work units and departmentalise the IT-related operations and maintenance activities.

Finally, segregation of duties cannot be established correctly without an appropriate IT audit programme, an effective risk-management strategy, as well as by an appropriate control environment.

How ISMS.online Helps

The new ISO 27002:2022 standard does not require you to do much other than upgrade your ISMS processes to reflect the improved controls. And if your team cannot manage this, ISMS.online can help you.

ISMS.online streamlines the ISO 27002 implementation process by providing a sophisticated cloud-based framework for documenting information security management system procedures and checklists to assure compliance with recognised standards.

When you use ISMS.online, you will be able to:

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Thanks to our cloud-based platform, it is now possible to centrally manage your checklists, interact with colleagues, and use a comprehensive set of tools to help your organisation create and operate an ISMS in accordance with worldwide best practices.

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New Controls

ISO/IEC 27002:2022 Control IdentifierISO/IEC 27002:2013 Control IdentifierControl Name
5.7NewThreat intelligence
5.23NewInformation security for use of cloud services
5.30NewICT readiness for business continuity
7.4NewPhysical security monitoring
8.9NewConfiguration management
8.10NewInformation deletion
8.11NewData masking
8.12NewData leakage prevention
8.16NewMonitoring activities
8.23NewWeb filtering
8.28NewSecure coding

Organisational Controls

ISO/IEC 27002:2022 Control IdentifierISO/IEC 27002:2013 Control IdentifierControl Name
5.105.1.1, 05.1.2Policies for information security
5.206.1.1Information security roles and responsibilities
5.306.1.2Segregation of duties
5.407.2.1Management responsibilities
5.506.1.3Contact with authorities
5.606.1.4Contact with special interest groups
5.7NewThreat intelligence
5.806.1.5, 14.1.1Information security in project management
5.908.1.1, 08.1.2Inventory of information and other associated assets
5.1008.1.3, 08.2.3Acceptable use of information and other associated assets
5.1108.1.4Return of assets
5.12 08.2.1Classification of information
5.1308.2.2Labelling of information
5.1413.2.1, 13.2.2, 13.2.3Information transfer
5.1509.1.1, 09.1.2Access control
5.1609.2.1Identity management
5.17 09.2.4, 09.3.1, 09.4.3Authentication information
5.1809.2.2, 09.2.5, 09.2.6Access rights
5.1915.1.1Information security in supplier relationships
5.2015.1.2Addressing information security within supplier agreements
5.2115.1.3Managing information security in the ICT supply chain
5.2215.2.1, 15.2.2Monitoring, review and change management of supplier services
5.23NewInformation security for use of cloud services
5.2416.1.1Information security incident management planning and preparation
5.2516.1.4Assessment and decision on information security events
5.2616.1.5Response to information security incidents
5.2716.1.6Learning from information security incidents
5.2816.1.7Collection of evidence
5.2917.1.1, 17.1.2, 17.1.3Information security during disruption
5.30NewICT readiness for business continuity
5.3118.1.1, 18.1.5Legal, statutory, regulatory and contractual requirements
5.3218.1.2Intellectual property rights
5.3318.1.3Protection of records
5.3418.1.4Privacy and protection of PII
5.3518.2.1Independent review of information security
5.3618.2.2, 18.2.3Compliance with policies, rules and standards for information security
5.3712.1.1Documented operating procedures

People Controls

ISO/IEC 27002:2022 Control IdentifierISO/IEC 27002:2013 Control IdentifierControl Name
6.107.1.1Screening
6.207.1.2Terms and conditions of employment
6.307.2.2Information security awareness, education and training
6.407.2.3Disciplinary process
6.507.3.1Responsibilities after termination or change of employment
6.613.2.4Confidentiality or non-disclosure agreements
6.706.2.2Remote working
6.816.1.2, 16.1.3Information security event reporting

Physical Controls

ISO/IEC 27002:2022 Control IdentifierISO/IEC 27002:2013 Control IdentifierControl Name
7.111.1.1Physical security perimeters
7.211.1.2, 11.1.6Physical entry
7.311.1.3Securing offices, rooms and facilities
7.4NewPhysical security monitoring
7.511.1.4Protecting against physical and environmental threats
7.611.1.5Working in secure areas
7.711.2.9Clear desk and clear screen
7.811.2.1Equipment siting and protection
7.911.2.6Security of assets off-premises
7.1008.3.1, 08.3.2, 08.3.3, 11.2.5Storage media
7.1111.2.2Supporting utilities
7.1211.2.3Cabling security
7.1311.2.4Equipment maintenance
7.1411.2.7Secure disposal or re-use of equipment

Technological Controls

ISO/IEC 27002:2022 Control IdentifierISO/IEC 27002:2013 Control IdentifierControl Name
8.106.2.1, 11.2.8User endpoint devices
8.209.2.3Privileged access rights
8.309.4.1Information access restriction
8.409.4.5Access to source code
8.509.4.2Secure authentication
8.612.1.3Capacity management
8.712.2.1Protection against malware
8.812.6.1, 18.2.3Management of technical vulnerabilities
8.9NewConfiguration management
8.10NewInformation deletion
8.11NewData masking
8.12NewData leakage prevention
8.1312.3.1Information backup
8.1417.2.1Redundancy of information processing facilities
8.1512.4.1, 12.4.2, 12.4.3Logging
8.16NewMonitoring activities
8.1712.4.4Clock synchronization
8.1809.4.4Use of privileged utility programs
8.1912.5.1, 12.6.2Installation of software on operational systems
8.2013.1.1Networks security
8.2113.1.2Security of network services
8.2213.1.3Segregation of networks
8.23NewWeb filtering
8.2410.1.1, 10.1.2Use of cryptography
8.2514.2.1Secure development life cycle
8.2614.1.2, 14.1.3Application security requirements
8.2714.2.5Secure system architecture and engineering principles
8.28NewSecure coding
8.2914.2.8, 14.2.9Security testing in development and acceptance
8.3014.2.7Outsourced development
8.3112.1.4, 14.2.6Separation of development, test and production environments
8.3212.1.2, 14.2.2, 14.2.3, 14.2.4Change management
8.3314.3.1Test information
8.3412.7.1Protection of information systems during audit testing
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