Which standards require an acceptable use policy?

ISO/IEC 27001:2022: 5.10; The NIS2 Directive: Art. 21(2)(g).

What must an acceptable use policy contain under ISO 27001?

5.10: Define and enforce rules for how information and assets may be used and handled. The ISO 27002 guidance beside 5.10: Requires rules for acceptable use, and procedures for handling information and its associated assets, to be identified, documented and put into effect.

Who should own the acceptable use policy?

The clauses imply the information security lead (CISO or ISMS manager). The register names the role so the line on your list can carry a name.

How often should an acceptable use policy be reviewed?

Annual (the register's default: the clauses say planned intervals and on significant change, and do not fix a period).

Is there a template for an acceptable use policy?

Yes: https://compliance.theartofservice.com/policy-templates/acceptable-use-policy

Every policy type · People

Acceptable use policy

The rules every user of the organisation's information and systems must follow, and what they agree to when they sign in.

How the register reads it

Also called	AUP, IT usage policy, end-user policy
Family	People
Document type	Policy. The regimes ask for the content, not the label; a line pasted as a standard, procedure, plan or schedule is placed here with the label noted.
Expected owner	The information security lead (CISO or ISMS manager).
Review cadence	Annual (the register's default: the clauses say planned intervals and on significant change, and do not fix a period).
On the gap list when	ISO 27001 or NIS2 is ticked and no line resolves to it.
Template	Acceptable use policy.

Which standards require it, and what each expects it to contain

2 requiring clauses, 2 regimes

Shown on a register for the regimes you tick; with none ticked, ISO 27001 is applied. Requirement text drawn from a human-verified compliance corpus under licence: the corpus statement of each clause, not the instrument verbatim.

ISO/IEC 27001:2022

ISO 27001 5.10 Acceptable use of information and other associated assets

Define and enforce rules for how information and assets may be used and handled.

What the ISO 27002 guidance expects the document to say: Requires rules for acceptable use, and procedures for handling information and its associated assets, to be identified, documented and put into effect.

Evidence an auditor accepts: The acceptable use rules, covering personal use, removable media, cloud storage, email, messaging and use of artificial intelligence services where relevant; handling procedures per classification level, covering storage, transmission, printing, sharing and destruction; evidence rules were communicated and accepted by personnel and by third parties given access
Common gap: Policy not reviewed or updated regularly
Source: ISO/IEC 27001:2022; guidance ISO/IEC 27002:2022

The NIS2 Directive

NIS2 Art. 21(2)(g) Basic cyber hygiene practices and cybersecurity training

Cyber hygiene is the common baseline the Directive expects everywhere: keeping software and hardware updated, managing configuration of devices, controlling and limiting administrator-level accounts, managing new installations, changing credentials, segmenting networks and backing up data. The recitals also point at zero-trust principles and user awareness as part of the same baseline. Training here is the workforce limb, distinct from the management body training in Article 20(2), and it needs to reach the roles that actually handle the risk rather than being one annual module for everyone. The value of this category to an auditor is that it is measurable: patch currency, privileged account counts and training completion are all countable, and a claim of good hygiene that cannot produce those numbers is not evidenced.

Evidence an auditor accepts: Patch and update currency reporting across the in-scope estate, including exceptions; secure configuration baselines and compliance measurement against them; the privileged account inventory with justification and periodic review
Common gap: Hygiene asserted for servers while endpoints, network devices and operational technology are unmeasured
Source: NIS2 Directive

Do this for every document on your list

Paste the list and get this reading for every document at once, with the owner and cadence against each, the clauses quoted, and the documents the regimes expect that the list does not carry. Eight documents free, no account.

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