Step-by-step implementation guide to ISO 27001 Annex A 7.3 Securing Offices, Rooms and Facilities and how to pass the audit.
What is it?
ISO 27001 Annex A 7.3 Securing Offices, Rooms and Facilities is an ISO 27001 control that requires an organisation to protect offices, rooms and facilities with physical security.
This is about giving the right people the right level of physical access so they can go about their business whilst keeping out people that you don’t want to have access.
Purpose
Annex A 7.3 is a preventive control that ensures you prevent unauthorised physical access, damage and interference to the organisations information and other associated assets in offices, rooms and facilities.
Definition
The ISO 27001 standard defines Annex A 7.3 as:
Physical security for offices, rooms and facilities should be designed and implemented.
ISO27001:2022 Annex A 7.3 Securing Offices, Rooms and Facilities
How to implement it
General Guidance
You are going to have to
- consult a legal professional to ensure you operate within the law and regulation
- only allow people you authorise into buildings, sites and physical locations
- implement physical security controls based on risk and business need
Considerations
There are considerations that may be appropriate
- consider putting confidential and sensitive information processing where it cannot be accessed by the public
- being aware of external building signage so as not to highlight information processing
- stopping people outside the physical boundary from seeing in or listening in
- electromagnetic shielding if you are NASA
- restricting access to internal contact directories and maps to those that need to know
The implementation of securing offices, rooms and facilities is in the context of the physical security perimeter where you can find guidance in the Ultimate guide to ISO 27001 Annex A 7.1 Physical Security Perimeter.
Health and Safety
Your number one priority is to meet the requirements of law and regulation. Be sure to engage with a legal professional to understand what you can and cannot do and to check that you are not breaking any laws. The most significant laws are those around health and safety as the protection of human life and wellbeing is always our number priority. There are common things that should be considered such as entry point doors that fail open. Whilst we want to protect buildings and information our absolute priority is to protect people.
Define your access control requirements
Start by understanding your risk and doing a risk assessment. For guidance on how, read The Complete Guide to ISO 27001 Risk Assessment. This is going to be based on the needs of the business and the risks that you are managing. As a starting point there are basics such as having locks on doors but you can asses the strength of those locks and if other additional controls such as bio metrics or gates are required. Do what is right for you. Consider the environment around the location and the threats that may be posed and be sensible in addressing them.
Topic specific physical and environmental security policy
To communicate to people what you do and what is expected you are going to write, sign off, implement and communicate your topic specific Physical and Environmental Security Policy.
Secure Areas
The standard gives the guidance that a secure area can be an office that is locked or some internal area that has an internal security barrier. It takes into account that your physical locations maybe internal sub divided based on protection requirements. Usually this is implemented when you have a file room, an archive room, or a room where you store old IT equipment. On premises data centres and data rooms fall into this category as well but in this day and age they are few and far between with most people adopting a cloud based strategy.
Implementation Steps
To comply with ISO 27001 Annex A 7.3 you are going to implement the ‘how’ to the ‘what’ the control is expecting. In short measure you are going to
- Define your physical access requirements
- Define your internal sub zone physical perimeter requirements
- Consult with a legal professional to ensure you are meeting legal and regulatory requirements
- Implement your physical security access
- Write, sign off, implement and communicate your topic specific Physical and Environmental Security Policy
- Write, sign off, implement and communicate your perimeter incident response procedures
- Implement a process of internal audit that checks that the appropriate controls are in place and effective and where they are not follow the continual improvement process to address the risks
ISO 27001 Templates
For Annex A 7.3 you need a topic specific Physical and Environmental Security Policy Template.
DO IT YOURSELF ISO 27001
All the templates, tools, support and knowledge you need to do it yourself.
What the auditor will check
The audit is going to check a number of areas. Lets go through them
1. That you have a physical entry control
One of the easier things for an auditor to check is the physical entry controls as it is usually the first thing they will encounter when they come to audit you if you have a physical location. For all the physical locations in scope they are going to visit and check.
2. The strength of the physical security access
They have been doing this a long time and done many audits so they know what to look for. They will test the controls and see what happens. They will try to open doors, open cupboards, gain access to areas they should not.
3. Documentation
They are going to look at audit trails and all your documentation. They will look at appropriate access reviews, logs of monitors and reports, incidents and how you managed them.
Mistakes People Make
The top 3 mistakes people make for ISO 27001 Annex A 7.3 are
1. Your physical security perimeter is turned off
What do I mean by turned off? In simple terms it means that you have a lockable door that should be locked and it not locked. You have a fire door that should be closed and locked but you have propped it open because it is a hot day.
2. One or more members of your team haven’t done what they should have done
Prior to the audit check that all members of the team have done what they should have. Have access reviews taken place? Who gets informed about about the alarm and do they still work here?
3. Your document and version control is wrong
Keeping your document version control up to date, making sure that version numbers match where used, having a review evidenced in the last 12 months, having documents that have no comments in are all good practices.
FAQ
A physical security entry system is a first line of defence, common sense and dare I say a no brainer. Think of your own house. Would you leave the door open, or unlocked when you are out? Even when you are in, to be fair. It’s a cruel world out there and not everyone has your best intention at heart. If you have something of value, be it physical or virtual, someone, somewhere wants it. That value you place on it will dictate the level of control you put in place.
You will need the ISO 27001 Physical and Environmental Security Policy
There are templates for ISO 27001 Annex A 7.3 located in the ISO 27001 Toolkit
ISO 27001 Annex A 7.3 Physical security for offices, rooms and facilities Sample PDFs can be found in the ISO 27001 Toolkit
If you have a physical location, office or processing facility, then yes.
Yes. You can write the policies for ISO 27001 Annex A 7.3 yourself. You will need a copy of the standard and approximately 8 hours to do it. It would be advantageous to have a background in information security management systems. Alternatively you can download them the ISO 27001 Physical and Environmental Security Policy
The main template you need is the Physical and Environmental Security Policy
ISO 27001 Annex A 7.3 is not particularly hard as it is mainly common sense. As long as you consult with a legal professional on what you are doing to ensure you are not break any laws or regulations you will be fine. Physical security has been around a long time.
To write the Physical and Environmental Security Policy will take about 8 hours. To implement the controls will depend on what you re doing and what you are implementing. It can take from a few hours to a few months depending on how many locations you have and the level of security that you are implementing.
The Physical and Environmental Security Policy will cost you 8 hours to write yourself or less than £10 to buy. The cost to implement the controls will depend on what controls you implement and where you buy them.
Matrix of ISO 27001 controls and attribute values
| Control type | Information security properties | Cybersecurity concepts | Operational capabilities | Security domains |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Preventive | Confidentiality | Protect | Physical security | Protection |
| Integrity | Asset Management | |||
| Availability |