GRC-04 Policy Exception Process
Whenever an established policy is departed from, an approved exception process required by the governance programme is set up and followed.
Source: CSA CCM v4.1, GRC-04. The statement above is our statement of the clause, read from the published text and cited so you can check it against the official text, not the instrument verbatim. Open CSA CCM v4.1 in the compliance library.
Version 4.1 adds 11 controls (among them API security, log sanitisation and a service bill of materials) and renumbers several domains. CSA accepts v4.0.x during its transition; if your STAR assessment is still on v4.0.1, check the numbering against it.
These are the artefacts auditors commonly ask for on this requirement, our guidance rather than text from the standard. Your assessor decides what is sufficient in your context, and asks for samples across the period when a report covers one.
system holds itEvidence a system already holds
none for this control
periodic reviewEvidence produced at each review
- Periodic exception review records · Policy repository / GRC workspace
- Sample of exceptions traced to approval · Policy repository / GRC workspace
governing documentDocuments that govern the control
- Exception procedure · Policy repository / GRC workspace
- Exception register with approvals, compensating controls and expiry · Policy repository / GRC workspace
- Escalation for expired exceptions · Policy repository / GRC workspace
First move
Common gaps auditors find
- Exceptions granted informally
- No expiry dates
- No periodic review
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 sheetGRC-03 Organizational Policy Reviews · GRC-05 Information Security Program