Powered by AI: Compliance automation for SOC 2

“The American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) initially created the Service Organization Control (SOC) certification.”

The SOC 2 compliance is a volunteer-oriented framework for organizations that handle customer information. This certification demonstrates their capability to deploy, sustain, and validate cybersecurity internal control, support Trust Services Criteria, and complete annual security awareness training and vulnerability assessments.

Tiebreaker AI is a market disruptor in the field of AI compliance automation with the ability to assist SOC 2 compliance organizations with a more streamlined, cost-effective, and secure way to maintain their various documents and collateral. This innovative compliance automation platform also supports ISO 27001 and other ISO frameworks. Many SOC 2 complaint organizations also leverage ISO 27001.

Do you hold a SOC 2 certification and want to lower your audit preparation costs and streamline your compliance journey? Click here to schedule a demo with the Tiebreaker AI sales team today!

What businesses should get SOC 2 certified? 

SaaS companies, cloud hosting providers, and organizations transmitting sensitive information are highly encouraged to achieve and sustain the SOC 2 compliance certification process. 

A significant component of SOC 2 compliance is creating and maintaining various security policy documents, security tools, and security training.  

What are the benefits of startups using AI for SOC 2 compliance? 

SOC 2 compliance certification helps startups demonstrate their commitment to data security. Achieving compliance certifications becomes time-consuming as startups develop and market their disruptive solutions, services, or products. 

Investing in AI compliance automation software helps startups achieve SOC 2. This achievement helps the business in several ways. Intrigued? Keep reading! 

Expedite customer trust 

Establishing early customer trust is critical for startups to achieve their various milestones and satisfy their investors and partners. Obtaining and sustaining SOC 2 TYPE II and SOC 2 TYPE 1 early gives startups a competitive advantage over similar firms. Customers looking to the startup community for new innovative solutions to replace legacy products will be more inclined to work with them based on their ability to sustain SOC 2 certification. 

Improved operational efficiencies 

Establishing operational efficiency earlier for startups helps create a positive culture within the firm, freeing up overhead expenses for additional product development and other business activities. 

Maintain regulatory compliance 

To become competitive, startups offering SaaS-based solutions or cloud-based services must achieve SOC 2 compliance. Enabling AI compliance helps a startup create process workflows based on proven automation during the company's inception instead of waiting until the firm has reached a more mature state.   

Leveraging AI for SOC 2 audit readiness 

Organizations expend considerable financial and human capital preparing for their various audits. Leveraging AI compliance automation helps in several critical areas of SOC 2 compliance and reduces the audit journey timeline. 

Updating SOC 2 compliance changes 

Like other compliance frameworks, changes to SOC 2 will happen semi or annually. These changes must be reflected within the organization's policy and procedures documentation, along with updating any changes to the questionnaire forms. AI compliance automation ensures all SOC 2-related documentation is updated with minimal manual workload. 

Leveraging a more collaborative approach to compliance management 

A substantial benefit gained with compliance automation is the ability to support a better collaboration culture. An AI-based solution helps collect and correlate the information supporting the various SOC 2 auditing and certification processes in one secure system. This ability to correlate to one platform also provides a single point of truth regarding the status of SOC 2 compliance for the organization. All stakeholders are now working from the same reporting system for better collaboration. 

How AI is transforming compliance automation 

Compliance management is a labor-intensive exercise for any organization. Data collection from various technical systems, constant changes to the SOC 2 framework, and reducing operational costs are essential for risk management and compliance operations teams. 

Security automation is key to reducing compliance management's human workload, identifying potential vulnerabilities early, and reducing other possible risks. AI is critical to ensuring that automation functions are executed at the highest level of efficiency and with fewer errors. Human error continues to be one of the leading causes of security breaches within the enterprise and cloud service provider sectors. 

Even with AI, human oversight still a must 

Human capital investment becomes more strategic, providing more oversight to compliance operations and less concern with performing manual-intensive work functions. Human interaction is also essential in developing and adjusting the AI automated workflows to complete SOC 2 compliance audit checklists and additional audit prep. 

Automated workflows can either help reduce errors or increase them. If they are set up and maintained correctly, workflows can also increase additional processing functionality, including reporting. 

These reports focus on an organization's information security controls over a typical six-month period for SOC 2 TYPE II compliance. A faulty process or automated workflow could jeopardize the SOC 2 compliance status. Reporting helps organizations recognize these faults sooner. 

Reducing SOC 2 certification cost through compliance automation 

Labor continues to be a significant component in every SOC 2 compliance program. Salaries for experienced risk management and compliance specialists and fees paid to external audit preparers continue to rise. 

SOC 2 Type 1 compliance is far less expensive than Type 2. Most organizations can complete Type 1 for less than $5000. However, organizations will incur additional expenses, including completing audits, performing readiness assessments, and conducting employee training. 

SOC 2 Type 2 is far more expensive because the auditing period, which includes front-end assessment, data collection, and the volume of artifacts requiring review before engaging external auditors, runs between 3 and 12 months. The average cost for a completed SOC 2 audit could exceed $100,000, including expenses for employee training, readiness assessments, and documentation updates. 

Another significant component of a SOC 2 Type 2 compliance audit is the cost of engaging external CPA firms, including members of the Big 4. Completing a SOC 2 audit by one of the Big 4 CPA firms demonstrated an even more significant commitment to data security.

The future of compliance automation 

Reflecting on 2024, the security and compliance landscape saw significant shifts in cost considerations, processing integrity, privacy regulations, and updates to the various trust services categories. 

Organizations sustaining their SOC 2 readiness along with preparing for the various audits need AI to help collect the necessary artifacts, automate the multiple questionnaires, and update the vast amounts of policies supporting the 5 Trust Service Criteria, including: 

• Security 

• Processing Integrity 

• Privacy 

• Confidentially 

• Availability 

Notable data breaches from Change Healthcare, Ticketmaster, and AT&T emphasized the necessity of ongoing monitoring, improved third-party risk management, regular security awareness training, and broader adoption of SOC 2 compliance. 

As compliance mandates become more complex and challenging for organizations to keep abreast of and update, AI compliance automation will become even more critical, especially regarding documentation upkeep. 

Why Tiebreaker AI? 

Engaging with AI compliance automation disruptors like Tiebreaker AI becomes a valuable decision for any organization. The field of compliance automation continues to grow with more providers. Tiebreaker AI continues to set the bar on compliance automation, a security-first mindset, and a culture promoting collaboration. 

Recently obtained SOC 2 compliance? Need an ongoing strategy to sustain this critical investment in promoting a security-first culture for your business?  

Schedule a demo with the Tiebreaker AI team today to see their platform in action!