PA-5 Set up emergency access
Set up emergency access accounts so an outage of the normal identity path cannot lock the organisation out of critical cloud infrastructure, and protect and monitor those accounts tightly.
4
artefacts
0
held by a system
1
at each review
hard
to go live
Policy repository / GRC workspace
where the evidence lives
teal = a system already holds it · olive = produced at each review
system holds itEvidence a system already holds
none for this control
periodic reviewEvidence produced at each review
- Periodic test records confirming the accounts still work · Identity provider / directory
governing documentDocuments that govern the control
- Emergency access account inventory and their exclusion scope · Policy repository / GRC workspace
- Credential custody and split-knowledge procedure · Policy repository / GRC workspace
- Alerting on any use of an emergency account · Policy repository / GRC workspace
First move
This control is evidenced by people and documents, not systems. Put the document under version control with an owner and review date, and log each review as a record with reviewer and date. Do not try to automate it.
Common gaps auditors find
- emergency accounts created but never tested and now expired
- no alert fires when an emergency account signs in
- emergency credentials stored in the same system they are meant to bypass
Do this for your whole sheet
Paste the rows you run your controls from and get this mapping for every control at once, with the periodic-review ones flagged and a first move per row. No account for the first run.
Build my evidence sheetPA-4 Review and reconcile user access regularly · PA-6 Use privileged access workstations