What evidence do auditors commonly ask for on A.5.18 Access rights?

Statement of Applicability entry for control A.5.18, showing inclusion or justified exclusion, implementation status and the risks it treats; Access request records showing owner authorization, and management approval where required, before rights were activated; A central record of access rights per user identifier across logical and physical access; Periodic access review records including privileged access, with evidence that removals identified in the review were actioned; Leaver and mover reports showing timely removal or adjustment of rights, including keys, cards and subscriptions.

What is the most common gap auditors find on A.5.18?

Access is cloned from a colleague's profile, carrying over excessive rights

ISO/IEC 27001:2022 · Organizational controls

`A.5.18` Access rights

Access rights to information and associated assets are to be granted, reviewed, changed and withdrawn in line with the access control rules and policy the organization has set. Purpose (stated in ISO/IEC 27002:2022): keeps access to information and assets defined and approved against what the business needs. As an Annex A reference control, it is compared with the controls determined in risk treatment (6.1.3 c) and recorded in the Statement of Applicability as included or excluded, with the justification and implementation status (6.1.3 d); implementation guidance is ISO/IEC 27002:2022 5.18.

Source: ISO/IEC 27001:2022, A.5.18. 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 ISO/IEC 27001:2022 in the compliance library.

Clauses 4 to 10 are the management-system requirements: none of them can be excluded when an organisation claims conformity. The 93 Annex A controls are a reference set: one may be excluded with a justification in the Statement of Applicability. Certification bodies assess conformity; the evidence lists here are what auditors commonly ask for, not a list the standard prescribes.

artefacts

held by a system

at each review

hard

to go live

Identity provider / directory

where the evidence lives

teal = a system already holds it · olive = produced at each review. To go live: easy when half or more of the artefacts are already held by a system, moderate from a quarter to a half, hard below a quarter.

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

Leaver and mover reports showing timely removal or adjustment of rights, including keys, cards and subscriptions · Identity provider / directory

periodic reviewEvidence produced at each review

Access request records showing owner authorization, and management approval where required, before rights were activated · Identity provider / directory
A central record of access rights per user identifier across logical and physical access · Physical access / facilities
Periodic access review records including privileged access, with evidence that removals identified in the review were actioned · Identity provider / directory

governing documentDocuments that govern the control

Statement of Applicability entry for control A.5.18, showing inclusion or justified exclusion, implementation status and the risks it treats · Policy repository / GRC workspace

First move

Mostly documents and reviews. Pull the 1 system-held artefact from your Identity provider / directory on a schedule; put the documents under version control with an owner and review date, and log each review as a dated record with a named reviewer.

Common gaps auditors find

Access is cloned from a colleague's profile, carrying over excessive rights
Access reviews are rubber-stamped by managers without owner involvement
Physical access badges are not revoked on the same timeline as logical accounts
Temporary access granted for projects is never removed

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 sheet

A.5.17 Authentication information · A.5.19 Information security in supplier relationships