Compliance and governance data

Compliance and governance data refers to digital records and information that demonstrate, enforce, or monitor an organization’s adherence to internal policies, regulatory requirements, industry standards, and best practices. This data is generated and maintained by software systems to ensure transparency, accountability, and control over business processes, data usage, and security.

The key characteristics of compliance and governance data are:

• Traceability: Provides a record of actions and decisions for audits and reviews
• Accountability: Links activities to users, roles, or systems
• Policy enforcement: Captures data related to the application and enforcement of rules or standards
• Auditability: Supports compliance audits and governance reviews

Compliance and governance data typically includes:

• Access control logs: Records showing who accessed sensitive files or systems, when, and what actions were performed
• Change management records: Documentation of software updates, configuration changes, and approval workflows
• Audit trails: Chronological records of system or application activities for accountability and investigation
• Policy acceptance records: User acknowledgments of internal policies or compliance training
• Data retention and deletion logs: Records related to the retention, archiving, or deletion of data as required by regulations
• Regulatory compliance reports: Automatically generated reports showing compliance status with specific regulations (for example, GDPR, HIPAA, SOX)
• Incident and breach records: Documentation of security incidents, investigations, and reporting to authorities or stakeholders