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Shared control area · counts toward 8 standards
Logging & monitoring
Logging and monitoring ensure that security-relevant events are captured in a centralized, immutable location to provide visibility into system activity. Frameworks require this because it is the primary mechanism for detecting intrusions, conducting forensic investigations, and ensuring accountability.
Implement it once
- Deploy a centralized log management system or SIEM to aggregate logs from all critical infrastructure.
- Configure systems to capture essential security events, including authentication attempts, privilege escalations, and configuration changes.
- Apply strict access controls and write-once storage (WORM) or cryptographic hashing to prevent the alteration or deletion of logs.
- Establish automated alerting for high-severity events that trigger immediate notification to the security team.
- Define and implement a data retention policy that ensures logs are stored for the minimum period required by the most stringent applicable regulation.
Evidence it produces
- Log configuration manifests showing exactly which event IDs and sources are being captured.
- Sample exports from the central log repository demonstrating successful aggregation.
- A register of alerting rules and corresponding tickets showing a history of alert triage and resolution.
- Documentation of the retention policy paired with evidence of storage duration (e.g., cloud bucket lifecycle settings).
Where it counts
Because visibility is a foundational requirement for incident response, this single implementation satisfies common requirements across nearly all security frameworks. Standardizing the logging architecture eliminates the need to create separate monitoring processes for different audits.