Introduction: Why Incident Management is Crucial for Your AI Business
As an AI company, your primary focus is on innovation – developing sophisticated algorithms and leveraging vast datasets to push the boundaries of what’s possible. However, in this dynamic environment, information security incidents are an unavoidable reality. For a business built on the integrity of its data and the reliability of its algorithms, the impact of an incident – from a poisoned training dataset or the theft of a proprietary algorithm – can be catastrophic, erasing your competitive edge and destroying stakeholder trust. This is where ISO 27001 Annex A 5.24 Information security incident management planning and preparation provides the international standard for building a robust and resilient incident management capability, turning potential chaos into a structured, manageable process.
Annex A 5.24 is a control within the ISO 27001 standard that requires your organisation to plan and prepare for managing information security incidents. In simple terms, it mandates that you define, establish, and communicate the necessary processes, roles, and responsibilities before an incident occurs, ensuring everyone knows what to do when something goes wrong.
The core purpose of this control is to act as a corrective measure, enabling a quick, effective, and orderly response to security incidents. The ultimate goal is to minimise operational disruption, protect sensitive information, and reduce the potential damage caused by any security event. By having a well-defined plan, you can maintain control during a high-pressure situation and safeguard your company’s most valuable assets.
Now that you understand why this is so important, let’s explore the essential components you need to put in place.
Table of contents
The Three Pillars of Incident Management Planning
Effective compliance with Annex A 5.24 is not about creating a single document that gathers dust on a shelf; it’s about building a complete operational framework that becomes part of your company’s DNA. This framework rests on three foundational pillars: clear roles, defined procedures, and structured reporting. For a fast-moving AI company, these pillars are strategically vital, enabling you to respond to threats decisively without slowing the pace of innovation. These pillars are not independent; your defined procedures will be executed by people in their assigned roles, and the outcomes will be captured through your reporting mechanisms, creating a closed-loop system for response and improvement.
Establishing Clear Roles and Responsibilities
In a real incident, ambiguity is your greatest enemy. Knowing exactly who does what before a crisis hits is critical to ensuring a calm, coordinated, and effective response. Your goal is to replace panic and confusion with a clear, pre-agreed process. To achieve this clarity, your organisation should take the following actions:
- Establish and document a clear, common method for reporting security events to a designated point of contact, ensuring that every employee knows how to raise an alarm.
- Assign responsibility for handling incidents to trained and competent personnel who are equipped with the necessary expertise to manage the situation.
- Ensure these individuals have full access to all procedural documentation so they can act decisively and according to the agreed-upon plan.
- Identify the training, certification, and ongoing professional development needs for your incident response team to keep their skills sharp and relevant to the evolving threat landscape.
- Promote company-wide awareness of how to report a security event, ensuring that every employee understands their role as the first line of defence.
A typical Incident Response Team (IRT) structure includes the following key roles:
| Role | Responsibility | Typical Owner |
|---|---|---|
| Incident Manager | Leads the response effort and has the authority to make critical decisions, such as the “shutdown” call. | CISO / IT Director |
| Lead Investigator | Manages the technical forensics, including log analysis and identifying the incident’s technical root cause. | Senior SysAdmin |
| Scribe | Meticulously documents every action taken, creating an official record that can be used for legal evidence and post-incident review. | Junior Admin / Ops |
| Communications | Manages all communication with external parties, including customers, the press, and regulatory bodies. | Marketing / Legal |
| HR Rep | Handles any internal disciplinary issues, particularly in cases involving an insider threat. | HR Manager |
Developing Your Incident Management Procedures
Your incident management procedures are the official playbook for your response team. They provide a step-by-step guide for handling an incident from initial detection through to final resolution and organisational learning. A comprehensive process must address the following key activities:
- Evaluation: Assessing events according to strict criteria to determine if they qualify as information security incidents.
- Monitoring and Detection: Continuously monitoring systems to detect, classify, analyse, and report on security events and potential incidents.
- Incident Handling: Managing incidents through to their conclusion, which includes executing a formal response, escalating issues as needed, and following controlled recovery procedures to minimise damage.
- Coordination: Working collaboratively with both internal teams (like legal and IT) and relevant external parties (such as authorities or suppliers) to ensure a unified response.
- Logging: Meticulously logging all incident management activities in a thorough, accessible, and transparent way to maintain a clear audit trail.
- Evidence Handling: Handling any collected evidence responsibly, in line with internal guidelines and any external legal or regulatory requirements.
- Root Cause Analysis: Conducting a thorough review after an incident is resolved to determine the underlying cause and not just the immediate symptoms.
- Lessons Learned: Recording all required improvements and implementing changes to security controls and processes to prevent the incident from happening again.
Creating Effective Reporting Mechanisms
Clear and consistent reporting is the glue that holds an incident management framework together. It ensures that stakeholders are kept informed, that actions are properly documented, and that the entire organisation can learn from the experience. Your reporting process should focus on four main areas:
- Mandate Immediate Actions: Define and communicate the exact first steps to take when an event is detected to ensure a swift and structured initial response.
- Standardise Information Capture: Implement mandatory incident forms to ensure all critical details are recorded consistently, supporting personnel as they carry out their duties.
- Establish a Feedback Loop: Create a formal process to inform reporters of the outcome of their reported incidents, encouraging future reporting.
- Drive Learning Through Detailed Reports: Use post-incident reports not just for compliance, but as a primary tool for root cause analysis and organisational learning.
Building these three pillars from scratch can be a complex task, but there is a practical way to accelerate your path to compliance.
The Solution: Achieving Compliance with the High Table ISO 27001 Toolkit
Implementing the framework just described doesn’t mean starting with a blank page. The High Table ISO 27001 Toolkit is the definitive solution for achieving a mature incident management capability efficiently. It provides the expert-developed structure, policies, and templates required to build your programme without reinventing the wheel.
Available at https://hightable.io/product/iso-27001-templates-toolkit/, this toolkit is designed to provide the governance structure and documentation you need to satisfy the requirements of Annex A 5.24 and pass your audit with confidence. It directly addresses the three pillars of incident management:
- Clarity on Roles and Responsibilities: The toolkit provides ready-to-use templates that help you formally document the required incident response roles and responsibilities within your organisation, ensuring there is no ambiguity when an incident occurs.
- A Proven Incident Management Procedure: It contains a comprehensive, pre-written Incident Management Procedure that covers all the critical activities discussed, from detection and analysis through to root cause analysis and continuous improvement.
- Auditor-Ready Reporting Mechanisms: The toolkit includes ready-to-use incident forms and report templates, ensuring your team can capture information consistently and effectively during and after an incident, creating a reliable record for review and compliance.
The primary benefit of this approach is that it saves your business a significant amount of time and effort. By starting with an auditor-verified foundation, you can adapt proven templates to your specific needs rather than attempting to create everything from scratch, allowing you to focus on what you do best – innovation.
With a clear plan and the right tools in hand, you can confidently build a more resilient organisation.
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Conclusion: Building a Resilient AI Business
Implementing ISO 27001 Annex A 5.24 is not a bureaucratic exercise; it is a fundamental step in building a prepared and resilient business that can withstand modern security challenges. By taking a proactive approach to incident management, you protect your innovations, data, and reputation.
The most critical takeaways for your AI company are:
- Plan and prepare for the inevitable; incidents are a matter of ‘when’, not ‘if’.
- Establish a clear framework of roles, procedures, and reporting to ensure a coordinated, effective response.
- Treat every incident as a learning opportunity to continuously harden your security posture.
For any AI company looking to protect its innovations and build lasting trust with its stakeholders, implementing a robust incident management framework is essential. The High Table ISO 27001 Toolkit offers the logical and practical first step on that journey.
About the author
Stuart Barker is a veteran practitioner with over 30 years of experience in systems security and risk management.
Holding an MSc in Software and Systems Security, Stuart combines academic rigor with extensive operational experience. His background includes over a decade leading Data Governance for General Electric (GE) across Europe, as well as founding and exiting a successful cyber security consultancy.
As a qualified ISO 27001 Lead Auditor and Lead Implementer, Stuart possesses distinct insight into the specific evidence standards required by certification bodies. He has successfully guided hundreds of organizations – from high-growth technology startups to enterprise financial institutions – through the audit lifecycle.
His toolkits represents the distillation of that field experience into a standardised framework. They move beyond theoretical compliance, providing a pragmatic, auditor-verified methodology designed to satisfy ISO/IEC 27001:2022 while minimising operational friction.
