What does the checker look for on a test account?

It reads the lines of your export and raises, where the columns support it: 2. owner has left, or owner not recognised; 3. no owner named, or a team named with no accountable person; 4. dormant for more than the threshold; 5. privileged, and orphaned or dormant; 6. password or key not changed within the period, or never; 8. credential stored in code, a config file or a script; 10. not reviewed within the interval; 12. created with no approval recorded. Each finding is a question for the account owner or the reviewer.

Account types

Test account

The person running the test owns it and switches it off when the test ends.

Who should own a test account, and which ISO/IEC 27001, SOC 2 and PCI DSS clauses apply?

The clauses the checker cites on a test account: ISO/IEC 27001 A.5.16, ISO/IEC 27001 A.5.18 and PCI DSS 8.2.6. Every clause it cites, across the seven regimes, is in the table below.

How the checker reads it

It is a user account people sign in with: PCI DSS reads it under the user-account periods (8.2.6, 7.2.4, 8.3.9), never under 8.6.
It needs a named person as owner; a blank owner, a team or a mailbox is finding 3, and an owner who has left by the staff list is finding 2.
The type comes from your type column; when that is blank the checker reads the account name and labels the type assumed from the name, and any finding resting on it is read as a question by the reviewer.

Findings that can apply

8 of 14

2. Owner has left, or owner not recognised: Who owns this account now, and should it still exist?
3. No owner named, or a team named with no accountable person: Which one person is accountable for this account and can say what it is for?
4. Dormant for more than the threshold: Is this account still needed, and if so by whom?
5. Privileged, and orphaned or dormant: Who holds these rights today, and do they still need them?
6. Password or key not changed within the period, or never: When was this credential last changed, and who knows it?
8. Credential stored in code, a config file or a script: Can this credential move into a vault, and who has read the file it sits in?
10. Not reviewed within the interval: Who reviews this account, and when is the next review due?
12. Created with no approval recorded: Where is the request and the approval for this account?

Clauses

4 cited

Regime	Clause
ISO/IEC 27001	ISO/IEC 27001 A.5.16 Identity management
ISO/IEC 27001	ISO/IEC 27001 A.5.18 Access rights
PCI DSS	PCI DSS 8.2.6 Inactive accounts removed within 90 days
CIS Controls	CIS Controls 5.1 Establish and Maintain an Inventory of Accounts

The first clause, set out

ISO/IEC 27001 A.5.16Identity management

Identities are to be managed throughout their whole life cycle. Purpose (stated in ISO/IEC 27002:2022): enables unique identification of people and systems accessing organizational assets and appropriate assignment of access rights. As an Annex A reference control, it is compared with the controls determined in risk treatment (6.1.3 c) and recorded in the Statement of Applicability as included or excluded, with the justification and implementation status (6.1.3 d); implementation guidance is ISO/IEC 27002:2022 5.16.

What an auditor asks to see: Statement of Applicability entry for control A.5.16, showing inclusion or justified exclusion, implementation status and the risks it treats; Identity management procedure covering creation, verification, activation, change, disablement and removal; Evidence that identities are verified against trusted documents before issue; A register of shared identities with the business justification and approval for each; A register of non-human identities (service accounts, machine identities) with segregated approval and an independent oversight record

Where account lists usually fall short: Generic shared accounts exist without documented justification or approval; Service accounts have no owner and no periodic oversight; Identities of leavers remain enabled for weeks because HR notifications are not integrated; The same person holds several identities in one directory, undermining accountability

Source: ISO/IEC 27001:2022 Annex A

A line that reads as this type

the type column left blank, invented values

test-uat-01 | | directory | | yes

See the specimen run