Leveling Up to Meet the PCI DSS v4.0 Challenges

Leveling Up to Meet the PCI DSS v4.0 Challenges

Introduction

Great leadership and management teams understand the importance of helping their teams to manage their stress and pressure levels.

Delivering v3.2.1 level 1 assessments already came with high-pressure and stress. Now, the new PCI DSS v4.0 has opened up this tap and significantly increased the water flow.

Using Automation to Open Up the Taps

Let's face it, the expectation that assessors can manage their level 1 assessments, without the aid of technlogy, should now be consigned to history. To mitigate the additional evidence-focused practices and to reduce the human error risk, the assessors need access to suitable technological solutions that can bear the brunt of any additional admin tasks that are required, in the completion of the new Report On Compliance (ROC) template.

Calculating the Return On Investment (ROI)

When weighing up the 'Pros & Cons' of a technological aid, it is important to consider both the tangible and intangible aspects, e.g.,

  • How many additional days would be needed to complete the circa 160% longer ROC template?
  • How much time, resources and effort would be needed to enhance the internal manual practices?
  • What additional stress and pressures will the new evidence-focused practices place on the assessors?
  • What are the potential risk factors for 'human error'?
  • If a technological aid could automate some (if not all) of the time-consuming adiministrative tasks, how might this improve the quality of your level 1 assessments?
  • How can a technological aid help to mitigate these issues?

Recommendations

If you have not done so already, research what technological aids are available to you to help simplify, automate (where practical) and harmonize your level 1 assessment practices, e.g.,

Consider your options, what challenges you are likely to face and how a suitable technological aid can help your team of assessors?

Conclusion

It might be tempting to struggle on with your level 1 assessments, using the analogue, manual practices. However, the PCI DSS v4.0 ROC template is going to add stress and pressures to your team, which will have an impact.

What will the potential impact be on your organization?

How are you planning to mitigate this impact?




Jim Seaman

Business Information Security Officer (BISO) | Cyber Security & Risk Consultant | PCI DSS Compliance Specialist | Author | Speaker | MSc, CISM, CRISC, CDPSE | 20+ Years in Security Risk Management

8 个月

For example, think of the time-saving provided by a technological aid that can instantly update the Assessment Summary table (Part 1, Section 1.8.1) based on any changes made to the Assessment Findings in Part 2. In the first table, a ZERO in a checkbox is automatically converted into an unmarked checkbox and a ONE (or above) is represented by an X within the corresponding checkboxes. Have you thought about how much time you are going to work through a minimum of 431 pages (landscape) and cross-reference the 260 Assessment Findings back to section 1.8.1 of Part One of the ROC Template? I bet that it's going to be considerably longer than it being INSTANTANEOUS, through the use of automation. ??

  • 该图片无替代文字
回复

要查看或添加评论,请登录

社区洞察

其他会员也浏览了