Common Challenges in SOC 2 Compliance

For many organizations, soc 2 compliance becomes urgent when enterprise customers, procurement teams, or partners demand proof of security controls. But SOC 2 isn’t a one-time document, it’s an ongoing system of policies, evidence, and operational discipline aligned to the AICPA Trust Services Criteria (TSC). The challenge is that most failures aren’t “security problems” alone, they’re process + evidence problems.

1) Scoping goes wrong early

A common soc 2 compliance blocker is unclear scope: which products, environments, regions, and supporting services are included? If you over-scope (everything, everywhere), evidence collection becomes unmanageable. If you under-scope, customers may reject the report. Strong scoping includes:

• Defined in-scope systems and boundaries (prod vs dev, shared services, SaaS dependencies)
• A clear system description (data flows, key assets, control ownership)
• A control inventory tied to real processes (not generic policy templates)

2) Controls exist on paper, not in practice

Many teams have policies (access control, change management, incident response), but day-to-day operations don’t follow them consistently. Auditors will test operating effectiveness by sampling tickets, logs, approvals, and exceptions. Typical gaps:

• No consistent access reviews for privileged accounts
• Weak joiner/mover/leaver processes (especially contractors)
• Emergency changes without post-approval documentation

3) Evidence is scattered and inconsistent

Evidence is the core of soc 2 compliance—and it breaks when artifacts live across Jira, GitHub, Google Drive, email threads, and cloud consoles. Common failures include:

• Screenshots without timestamps or context
• Missing audit trails for approvals (who approved what, when)
• No single “source of truth” for policies and procedures

Fix: centralize evidence by control, define an evidence owner, and standardize naming (Control ID + date + artifact type).

4) Vendor and cloud responsibility confusion

SOC 2 doesn’t transfer responsibility to your cloud provider. If you run on AWS/Azure/GCP, you still own configuration, IAM, logging, and monitoring. A recurring soc 2 compliance challenge is weak third-party risk management:

• Missing vendor due diligence and contract security clauses
• No review of SOC reports from critical vendors
• No process to track vendor security changes and incidents

5) Continuous monitoring isn’t mature

SOC 2 expects control operations to be repeatable. If alerts, vulnerability remediation, backups, and incident response aren’t tracked with metrics, it’s hard to prove consistent operation. Use lightweight KPIs:

• Patch SLAs (critical/high)
• Access review completion rate
• Incident response drill frequency
• Logging coverage for key systems