Database
How Database Auditing And Monitoring Fit Within A Sox Compliance.
Data audit refers to the auditing of data to assess its quality or utility for a specific purpose (Florimond et al.,2017). Auditing data, unlike auditing finances, involves looking at key metrics, other than quantity, to create conclusions about the properties of a data set. In our case here, when we discuss data auditing, we are talking about the specific act of creating a log of all your data transactions.
Database monitoring is the process in which database performance and resources are tracked to create and maintain high performance and highly available application infrastructure (Florimond et al.,2017).
Sox compliance is an act that was passed to protect shareholders and the general public from accounting errors and fraudulent practices in enterprises and to improve the accuracy of corporate disclosures. The bill sets deadlines for compliance and publishes rules on requirements (Blankley, Hurtt & MacGregor, 2019).
This was designed in the hopes of reducing fraud and conflicts of interest while increasing financial transparency and public confidence in the markets. SOX defines a framework that makes it harder for executives to claim that they were unaware of the information is compromised (Blankley, Hurtt & MacGregor, 2019). Under the act, companies must maintain proven auditing practices and assure integrity and timeliness of data. This meant introducing new procedures around protecting data, creating backup and recovery processes, and ensuring the auditing, encryption, and restricted access to standardized data.
How They Fit In A Sox Compliance:
Database auditing and monitoring fit in a sox compliance to improve the accuracy and reliability of corporate financial disclosures and to force companies to be more transparent. To this end, they also establish organizations to oversee corporate auditing practices and to develop the rules, standards, and quality control mechanisms that govern financial reporting.
They are first arranged then broken down into individual sections (Florimond et al.,2017). Each chapter defines a different aspect of organizational responsibilities for achieving financial transparency and avoiding fraudulent practices. Corporate officers are legally bound to carry out all the requirements and ensure the accuracy and completeness of all financial disclosures. Even though it is the responsibility of the officers to carry out the brunt complying with the SOX regulations is a companywide effort, where most of the departments are involved in the process. For many organizations, however, much of their financial data resides in databases.
Most of SOX regulations leave it up to the corporation to figure out the best methods to use to comply with the law (Blankley, Hurtt & MacGregor, 2019). All officers working for a public company should familiarize themselves with the regulations, particularly those sections most relevant to compliance.
References
Florimond, C., Andrevon, T., Le Marier, M., & El Kaoui, H. (2017). U.S. Patent Application No. 15/066,733.
Blankley, A., Hurtt, D., & MacGregor, J. (2019). An exploration of choice to comply voluntarily with SOX section 404 (b). Managerial Auditing Journal.