Skip to the text
In this act Article 21 of 42

Article 21 — Access control

Financial servicesLevel 2RTSDORAIn forceOfficial source

As part of their control of access management rights, financial entities shall develop, document, and implement a policy that contains all of the following:

21(a)
a)the assignment of access rights to ICT assets based on need-to-know, need-to-use and least privilege principles, including for remote and emergency access;
Copy link
21(b)
b)the segregation of duties designed to prevent unjustified access to critical data or to prevent the allocation of combinations of access rights that may be used to circumvent controls;
Copy link
21(c)
c)a provision on user accountability, by limiting to the extent possible the use of generic and shared user accounts and ensuring that users are identifiable for the actions performed in the ICT systems at all times;
Copy link
21(d)
d)a provision on restrictions of access to ICT assets, setting out controls and tools to prevent unauthorised access;
Copy link
21(e)
e)account management procedures to grant, change or revoke access rights for user and generic accounts, including generic administrator accounts, including provision on all of the following:
Copy link
21(e)(i)
i)assignment of roles and responsibilities for granting, reviewing, and revoking access rights;
Copy link
21(e)(ii)
ii)assignment of privileged, emergency, and administrator access on a need-to-use or an ad-hoc basis for all ICT systems;
Copy link
21(e)(iii)
iii)withdrawal of access rights without undue delay upon termination of the employment or when the access is no longer necessary;
Copy link
21(e)(iv)
iv)update of access rights where changes are necessary and at least once a year for all ICT systems, other than ICT systems supporting critical or important functions and at least every 6 months for ICT systems supporting critical or important functions;
Copy link
21(f)
f)authentication methods, including all of the following:
Copy link
21(f)(i)
i)the use of authentication methods commensurate to the classification established in accordance with Article 8(1) of Regulation (EU) 2022/2554 and to the overall risk profile of ICT assets and considering leading practices;
Copy link
21(f)(ii)
ii)the use of strong authentication methods in accordance with leading practices and techniques for remote access to the financial entity’s network, for privileged access, for access to ICT assets supporting critical or important functions or ICT assets that are publicly accessible;
Copy link
21(g)
g)physical access controls measures including:
Copy link
21(g)(i)
i)the identification and logging of natural persons that are authorised to access premises, data centres, and sensitive designated areas identified by the financial entity where ICT and information assets reside;
Copy link
21(g)(ii)
ii)the granting of physical access rights to critical ICT assets to authorised persons only, in accordance with the need-to-know and least privilege principles, and on an ad-hoc basis;
Copy link
21(g)(iii)
iii)the monitoring of physical access to premises, data centres, and sensitive designated areas identified by the financial entity where ICT and information assets or both reside;
Copy link
21(g)(iv)
iv)the review of physical access rights to ensure that unnecessary access rights are promptly revoked.\
Copy link

For the purposes of point (e)(i), financial entities shall establish the retention period taking into account the business and information security objectives, the reasons for recording the event in the logs, and the results of the ICT risk assessment.

For the purposes of point (e)(ii), financial entities shall, where possible, use dedicated accounts for the performance of administrative tasks on ICT systems. Where feasible and appropriate, financial entities shall deploy automated solutions for the privilege access management.

For the purposes of point (g)(i), the identification and logging shall be commensurate with the importance of the premises, data centres, sensitive designated areas, and the criticality of the operations or ICT systems located therein.

For the purposes of point (g)(iii), the monitoring shall be commensurate to the classification established in accordance with Article 8(1) of Regulation (EU) 2022/2554 and the criticality of the area accessed.

CHAPTER III — ICT-related incident detection and response