Understanding SOC 2 Compliance Requirements (2025): A Crucial Step Before Your Audit

Achieving SOC 2 compliance can feel like trying to follow a recipe written without measurements. You know what ingredients matter—access controls, monitoring, documentation, and training—but how much of each do you need? Which should come first? What is absolutely required, and what is optional?

The truth is, there is no universal checklist for SOC 2. And that's precisely why many organizations get stuck before they start. This guide breaks down SOC 2 compliance requirements in practical, actionable terms.

Discover the flexibility of SOC 2 compliance, empowering you to prioritize what matters, adapt to your unique circumstances, and avoid building processes that could slow you down.

By the end of this guide, you'll have a realistic and confident understanding of what “good enough” SOC 2 compliance looks like, especially if you're a growing company or SaaS business preparing for your first audit. Remember, compliance is achievable without operational slowdown.

What Is a SOC 2 Report?

A SOC 2 report is a third-party validation that demonstrates your company's commitment to protecting customer data. If you store, process, transmit, or access sensitive customer information, you will likely need to provide a SOC 2 report during vendor security assessments.

This is especially true in:

• SaaS and cloud-native products

• B2B platforms handling client or user data

• Healthcare, fintech, HR tech, AI/ML platforms

• Any system where customer trust is foundational

To obtain a SOC 2 report, your organization undergoes an independent audit performed by a CPA firm accredited to review SOC controls. The auditor assesses whether your internal controls are appropriately designed and, in some cases, whether they are consistently operating over time.

A SOC 2 report is not a certification badge or one-time milestone. It reflects your current security maturity and operational discipline. As your systems and teams evolve, your controls must evolve too. For more background, see understanding the SOC 2 report.

SOC 1 vs SOC 2 vs SOC 3: What's the Difference?

There are three types of SOC reports, and each serves a different purpose:

SOC 1

• Focuses on controls related to financial reporting.

• Typically requested by organizations that process financial transactions or support accounting workflows.

• Relevant when inaccurate financial data could impact customers or investors.

SOC 2

• Focuses on information security controls that affect data privacy, system resilience, and operational integrity.

• Applicable to most technology providers, especially SaaS and cloud-based platforms.

• This is the report most customers will ask for when evaluating your security posture.

SOC 3

• A public summary of a SOC 2 report.

• Contains no sensitive details and is often shared on trust or security webpages to signal maturity and reliability.

When potential customers ask for a SOC report, they almost always mean SOC 2. If you're building software, handling user data, processing transactions, or integrating with enterprise systems, SOC 2 is the framework customers expect. For an in-depth comparison, see SOC 1 vs SOC 2 vs SOC 3 .

SOC 2 Type 1 vs Type 2

Once you know you need a SOC 2 report, the next question is which type to pursue. There are two types, and they differ in scope and timeline:

SOC 2 Type 1

• Evaluates whether your security controls are appropriately designed at a single point in time.

• Useful when you need quick proof of security, such as during early-stage sales conversations.

• Often completed in a few weeks with a focused readiness effort.

SOC 2 Type 2

• Evaluates whether your controls are designed and operating effectively over a period of time, usually 3 to 12 months.

• Required by enterprise, healthcare, regulated industries, and companies with formal security review teams.

• Provides stronger credibility but requires operational consistency.

Practical Recommendation

Most companies benefit from a phased approach:

• Start with SOC 2 Type 1 to unblock deals and demonstrate that you have the proper controls in place (preparing for your first SOC 2 audit).

• Transition to SOC 2 Type 2 once processes are stable, trained, and documented.

This allows your business to maintain momentum while maturing security practices gradually.

SOC 2 Compliance Requirements: The Trust Services Criteria (TSC)

Unlike ISO 27001, which provides a formal and prescriptive framework, SOC 2 is built on the Trust Services Criteria (TSC). The TSC outlines what must be achieved, not how to achieve it.

This flexibility is intentional. SOC 2 is designed to adapt to:

• Different architectures (cloud, on-prem, hybrid)

• Different company sizes

• Different operational models

There are five Trust Services Criteria:

• Security (Common Criteria – required for all SOC 2 reports)

• Availability

• Processing Integrity

• Confidentiality

• Privacy

What Most Organizations Choose

Most startups, SaaS platforms, and modern data companies select: Security + Availability + Confidentiality

This scope keeps compliance focused and efficient while maintaining customer trust. Expanding too early increases cost and operational burden. You can expand the scope later if customers or regulators require it.

Translating SOC 2 Criteria into Real-World Controls

The Trust Services Criteria tell you what to accomplish. Your controls define how you accomplish it.

Here's what SOC 2 controls look like in practice without unnecessary complexity:

Access Controls

Ensure only the right people have access to the right systems. This typically includes:

• Multi-factor authentication (MFA)

• Role-based access control (RBAC)

• Standardized onboarding and offboarding procedures

• Quarterly access and permission reviews

The goal is to prevent accidental or unauthorized access, not to create administrative bottlenecks.

System Monitoring

Detect unusual activity and respond quickly. This usually involves:

• Centralized logging

• Alerting rules for suspicious behavior

• Incident response playbooks

• Regular testing of escalation workflows

Monitoring should be consistent and visible—not reactive or ad hoc.

Change Management

Ensure that system updates are intentional, reviewed, and traceable. Common patterns include:

• Pull request (PR) approvals

• Version-controlled code repositories

• Deployment logs

• The ability to roll back when necessary

Change management is not about slowing down engineering; it's about avoiding outages and configuration drift.

Vendor Risk Management

Track the third-party tools your organization depends on. Key components:

• A complete SaaS and vendor inventory

• Data classification (what data each vendor touches)

• Risk ratings to prioritize review

• Signed security agreements (e.g., DPAs, BAAs)

Vendor risk grows silently, which is why tracking is essential early. For more structure, see Vendor Risk Management Checklist .

Risk Mitigation & Continuity Planning

Prepare for downtime or service interruption before it happens. This typically includes:

• Regular backups and test restores

• Disaster recovery (DR) runbooks

• Business continuity planning (BCP) exercises

These controls help ensure resilience, not just compliance.

SOC 2 Readiness Assessment (High ROI Step)

Before you schedule an audit, running a SOC 2 readiness assessment is one of the highest-value steps you can take. The readiness phase helps you:

• Map your current controls to the Trust Services Criteria

• Identify and close gaps proactively

• Ensure documentation habits are consistent

• Establish where evidence should be stored

• Avoid delays and rework during the audit itself

Think of readiness as an audit rehearsal. It gives you clarity, direction, and confidence. DSALTA’s Zero to Audit-Ready guide walks through this phase in detail.

SOC 2 Execution: Timeline, Evidence, Common Pitfalls, and Best Practices

Now that we've clarified what SOC 2 is and how to translate the Trust Services Criteria into practical controls, the next question becomes how to get through the audit without chaos. The key to a smooth SOC 2 process is predictability. When your controls are repeatable and your evidence collection is routine, the audit becomes much more straightforward.

This part of the guide walks through:

• The SOC 2 readiness and audit timeline

• What “evidence” looks like in day-to-day operations

• The most common places teams get stuck and how to fix them

• Best practices to stay compliant without creating unnecessary overhead

By the end, you'll know what your audit journey will feel like, how to avoid delays, and how to maintain compliance without turning your organization into a documentation factory.

The SOC 2 Timeline: What Actually Happens

The SOC 2 process is structured but flexible. The timeline depends on whether you are pursuing a Type 1 or Type 2 report. Here is the typical sequence most organizations follow:

Stage 1: Readiness Assessment

Purpose: Understand where your organization currently stands and identify gaps.

What happens:

• Controls are mapped to the Trust Services Criteria.

• Policies and procedures are reviewed.

• Missing documentation or workflows are identified.

• You tune and standardize where needed.

This phase is usually 2–6 weeks, depending on how mature your controls are to begin with. During readiness, the goal is not perfection.

The goal is clarity:

• Which controls exist

• Which need refinement

• Who owns which policies

• Where evidence should live

• How frequently activities need to happen

Attempting to “fix everything at once” is the mistake nearly every company makes. Prioritize repeatability over complexity.

Stage 2: Operating Period (Type 2 Only)

If you are pursuing Type 2, you'll enter a period where you run your business normally, while collecting evidence that your controls are being applied consistently.

Purpose: Demonstrate operational consistency over time.

What happens:

• Teams follow defined workflows.

• Approvals, logs, and training records accumulate naturally.

• Monitoring and alerting run in the background.

• Changes to systems are tracked through your normal deployment processes.

This stage lasts 3–12 months, depending on how quickly you want the report. If you are doing a Type 1, this stage is skipped.

Stage 3: SOC 2 Audit

Once your evidence period is complete—or for Type 1, once readiness is done—the auditor begins their review.

Purpose: Independent verification by a CPA firm.

What happens:

• Auditor interviews control owners.

• Auditor requests and reviews evidence.

• Questions and clarifications go back and forth.

• Final SOC 2 report is issued.

This typically takes 4–8 weeks. Auditors do not expect your controls to be perfect; they expect them to be documented, intentional, and consistent.

A company with:

• Simple controls

• A clear owner for each control

• Lightweight but regular documentation

will outperform a company with big, complex, impressive-looking controls that no one actually follows.

If You Need Speed: Start with Type 1

If a customer is waiting on a security attestation before signing a contract, the quickest path is:

• Complete SOC 2 Type 1.

• Begin the operating period for Type 2 immediately after.

This approach:

• Unblocks revenue faster.

• Reduces the cost of rushing implementation.

• Builds maturity gradually.

Type 1 is your checkpoint. Type 2 is your proof of reliability over time.

What SOC 2 Evidence Really Looks Like

One of the most common misconceptions is that evidence for SOC 2 requires heavy paperwork or special systems. In reality, evidence is proof that your normal processes are being followed.

Here is what evidence typically looks like across major control categories:

Access Controls

The auditor wants to see that access to systems is intentional and reviewed. Examples of evidence include:

• Onboarding and offboarding checklists

• Permission change logs

• Periodic access review records

• Audit trails from Okta, Google Workspace, Azure AD, or your IAM tool

If you have a repeatable offboarding process and MFA is enforced, you are already ahead of many teams.

Authentication & Single Sign-On (SSO)

Evidence may include:

• Screenshots showing MFA enforcement

• Policy documents describing authentication rules

• Configuration exports from your identity provider

This is often one of the most straightforward and impactful controls in the entire audit.

Change Management

The auditor is validating that changes to production systems are reviewed and traceable. Evidence may include:

• Pull requests with approval history

• Code deployment logs

• Jira or ticketing records showing change tracking

• Rollback instructions or procedures

This is typically already part of standard engineering practice in mature teams.

Incident Response

The goal here is to show that you respond systematically when something goes wrong. Evidence might include:

• Incident tickets

• Post-incident review / retrospective notes

• Tabletop exercise summaries

You do not need dozens of incidents; even one well-documented tabletop exercise can demonstrate readiness.

Vendor Risk Management

Evidence demonstrates awareness and control over third-party risk. Common examples:

• SaaS/vendor inventory spreadsheet or dashboard

• Data classification records

• Risk ratings or security review notes

• Signed DPAs or BAAs

Vendor management is often one of the most overlooked areas, yet also one of the easiest to standardize. See the Vendor Risk Management Checklist for a structured approach.

Security Awareness Training

The auditor wants to see that people are trained, not just systems. Evidence may include:

• Completion records from your training platform

• Training slide decks or video resources

• Annual or quarterly refresher logs

Training does not need to be elaborate. It needs to be consistent.

Where Teams Commonly Get Stuck (and How to Fix It Quickly)

Most SOC 2 delays are not caused by missing tools or infrastructure; they come from a lack of clarity, ownership, and cadence.

Here are the three most common friction points and simple fixes to resolve them:

Problem 1: Access Reviews Are Planned, but Not Scheduled

Teams often know they should review user access, but forget to do it consistently.

Quick fix:

• Schedule access reviews quarterly in the calendar.

• Assign exactly one person as the control owner.

• Maintain a simple, version-controlled tracking sheet.

The review itself usually takes less than one hour.

Problem 2: Vendor Inventory Is Outdated

Most organizations adopt tools faster than they track them. The result is unclear risk and missing contract oversight.

Quick fix:

• Start a single source of truth that includes:

  • Tool name

  • System owner

  • Data classification

  • Risk rating

  • Security commitments (e.g., SOC 2, ISO 27001, HIPAA)

Even a spreadsheet is perfectly acceptable. What matters is ownership and updates.

Problem 3: Incident Response Only Happens After Something Goes Wrong

Teams often assume they will handle incidents well, but hope is not a plan.

Quick fix:

• Run a tabletop exercise:

  • Pick a hypothetical scenario.

  • Walk through how the team would detect, communicate, and respond.

  • Capture notes and next steps.

This provides instant evidence and improves operational confidence.

Best Practices to Make SOC 2 Manageable

You don't need to build an extensive security program to achieve SOC 2. You need simple, intentional, repeatable workflows.

Here are the practices that make the most significant difference:

Start with the Smallest Reasonable Scope

Include only systems that store or process customer data. This reduces workload and speeds up the audit.

Assign Clear Ownership

Each control should have one directly responsible individual (DRI). Shared responsibility is where evidence gaps appear.

Automate What Repeats

Calendar reminders, lightweight workflow automation, or SSO enforcement reduce manual effort and missed deadlines.

Train People Early and Consistently

Most security incidents come from human error, not system flaws.

Document as You Go

Save evidence weekly, not once a year. This avoids stress and improves audit outcomes.

What "Good Enough" Looks Like

SOC 2 compliance does not require perfection. It requires:

• Defined controls

• Consistent follow-through

• Evidence that shows your organization is disciplined

You don't need dozens of new tools or a heavy compliance burden. You need clarity, repeatability, and ownership.

You Can Do This Without Slowing Down Your Business

SOC 2 is not about checking boxes; it's about proving that your company can be trusted. The key is to build light, intentional workflows that your team can actually maintain.

With the right approach, your organization can earn SOC 2 compliance in weeks, not months, and stay compliant without adding operational drag. For an AI-powered approach, see SOC 2 Compliance in 2025 .

Ready to Get SOC 2 Audit-Ready in Days, Not Months?

Most teams struggle with SOC 2 because they try to do everything manually—tracking evidence in spreadsheets, chasing stakeholders, and trying to “remember” what to save for the audit.

You don't need to do that. DSALTA's AI Compliance Agent works alongside your team to:

• Identify exactly which SOC 2 controls apply to your environment.

• Auto-generate policies, workflows, and control mappings.

• Monitor systems continuously and collect audit evidence in the background.

• Automate access reviews, vendor checks, and training reminders.

• Keep you compliant year-round—not just at audit time.

This means what usually takes 3–9 months can be done in days or weeks, without slowing down product development.

If you want SOC 2 to feel like a straightforward, repeatable workflow instead of a compliance maze, see how the AI Compliance Agent gets you audit-ready fast.