SOC 2 Risk Plans: Monitoring Best Practices
SOC 2 compliance is essential for protecting sensitive healthcare data like PHI (Protected Health Information). To simplify and strengthen your monitoring plan, focus on these key steps:
- Choose Trust Services Criteria (TSC): Prioritize criteria like security, privacy, and availability based on your organization’s risks.
- Maintain Critical Documents: Keep security policies, incident response plans, and risk management documentation updated.
- Define Team Roles: Assign clear responsibilities for security operations, compliance, and risk management.
- Implement Monitoring: Use scheduled audits, 24/7 security checks, and automation tools like Censinet RiskOps for continuous compliance.
- Update Regularly: Adapt plans for new regulations, learn from past security events, and track emerging threats.
SOC 2 monitoring ensures compliance, strengthens trust, and protects sensitive data. Start with clear roles, robust documentation, and automated tools to streamline your efforts.
SOC 2 Compliance with Continuous Controls Monitoring
SOC 2 Risk Monitoring Plan Elements
A strong SOC 2 monitoring plan is built on three key components: Trust Services Criteria, important documentation, and well-defined team roles.
Choosing Trust Services Criteria
When selecting Trust Services Criteria (TSC), focus on areas that align with your organization's specific risks. These may include privacy, security, availability, processing integrity, and third-party risks. Once you've identified these criteria, ensure you have the necessary documentation to support and maintain them.
Important SOC 2 Documents
Here are some critical documents to include in your plan:
- Security policies
- Incident response plans
- Risk management documentation
These documents form the backbone of your monitoring efforts and should be kept up to date.
Defining Team Roles
Assign specific responsibilities to team members to ensure effective monitoring and response:
- Security Operations: Oversee control monitoring and handle incident responses.
- Compliance Officers: Ensure SOC 2 alignment and coordinate audit processes.
- Risk Management: Identify emerging threats and revise mitigation strategies as needed.
Tools like Censinet RiskOps can streamline these tasks, offering real-time collaboration and secure sharing of risk-related data.
SOC 2 Monitoring Methods
Once roles are defined and documentation is set, it's time to implement monitoring. In healthcare, SOC 2 monitoring relies on a mix of scheduled audits, continuous security checks, and automated compliance processes.
Security Audit Schedule
Regular audits are a cornerstone of SOC 2 compliance. Focus on:
- Quarterly control reviews in line with Trust Services Criteria
- Annual external assessments conducted by certified auditors
- Risk-based updates to audit scope to account for organizational changes
After establishing a baseline audit, transition to continuous monitoring and automation to maintain ongoing compliance.
24/7 Security Monitoring
Around-the-clock monitoring of networks and logs helps spot unusual activity as it happens. Tools like Censinet RiskOps gather real-time cybersecurity and risk data from healthcare delivery organizations (HDOs) and their vendors. This ensures instant alerts and a smooth response process. These alerts are directly integrated into your incident-response workflow, keeping everything documented and actionable.
Monitoring Automation
Automation plays a crucial role in enforcing the controls laid out in your SOC 2 plan. By automating workflows, teams can monitor more effectively and reduce human errors.
"Censinet RiskOps enables us to automate and streamline our IT cybersecurity, third‑party vendor, and supply chain risk programs in one place. Censinet enables our remote teams to quickly and efficiently coordinate IT risk operations across our health system."
- Aaron Miri, CDO, Baptist Health [1]
Key advantages of automation include:
- Centralized workflows for IT cybersecurity, vendor, and supply chain risk management
- The ability to scale vendor assessments with fewer resources
- Faster risk responses powered by AI-driven alerts
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Updating SOC 2 Risk Plans
Keeping your SOC 2 risk plans current is essential for staying compliant and effective, especially in a constantly evolving security landscape.
Update for New Regulations
When regulations change, your SOC 2 risk plans should follow suit. Address areas like patient data protection, medical device security, supply chain risks, IRB/research processes, and vendor management. Tools such as Censinet RiskOps can simplify this process by sharing risk data securely and offering benchmarking features across healthcare organizations and their partners. Ensure these updates align with your selected Trust Services Criteria to stay on track with SOC 2 objectives.
Learning from Security Events
Use past security incidents as learning opportunities to improve your SOC 2 controls. Document each event, identify recurring attack patterns, and address any gaps in your protocols. This approach not only strengthens your defenses but also helps you respond faster in the future.
"We looked at many different solutions, and we chose Censinet because it was the only solution that enabled our team to significantly scale up the number of vendors we could assess, and shorten the time it took to assess each vendor, without having to hire more people." [1]
Will Ogle, CDO at Nordic Consulting, highlights how Censinet made vendor assessments more efficient and scalable without adding staff.
Tracking New Security Threats
Stay ahead of emerging threats by taking proactive measures:
- Implement around-the-clock monitoring for networks and systems.
- Regularly update risk profiles to address new vulnerabilities and threat vectors.
- Share anonymized threat data through platforms like Censinet RiskOps to boost awareness across your ecosystem.
SOC 2 Monitoring Tools
Once you've established your monitoring methods and update schedules, consider these types of tools to help automate and simplify SOC 2 risk management.
Risk Assessment Tools
Censinet RiskOps™ is designed for healthcare organizations, automating SOC 2 assessments across complex ecosystems. It’s particularly useful for managing multiple risk factors efficiently.
Document Management Systems
Document management systems can help you organize and streamline your evidence collection and review processes. Key features include:
- Centralized storage for evidence, with version control and audit trails
- Automated workflows for reviews and approvals
For example, Intermountain Health utilized Censinet's risk management tools and benchmarking features to better understand their cybersecurity strategies and resource allocation [1].
Team Communication Tools
Choose communication tools that enable secure, real-time collaboration. Look for platforms that integrate with your risk management systems and allow seamless sharing of assessment results.
Summary
Managing SOC 2 risk monitoring in healthcare requires strong tools, regular evaluations, and customized processes. Many healthcare organizations now use specialized platforms to handle their complex risk environments effectively. By aligning with Trust Services Criteria, conducting continuous audits, updating plans to address new threats and regulations, and utilizing automation and benchmarking tools, vendors can protect PHI, simplify compliance efforts, and address changing risks.
Key elements for success in SOC 2 risk monitoring include:
- Automating IT cybersecurity, third-party vendor management, and supply chain risk management
- Using peer benchmarking to gain insights and allocate resources effectively
- Ensuring secure sharing of cybersecurity and risk data between healthcare organizations and vendors
These practices highlight the importance of choosing the right criteria, maintaining ongoing monitoring, revising risk plans as needed, and using specialized tools to stay compliant. SOC 2 risk monitoring requires adaptable processes that grow with your organization while maintaining compliance.
