Sarbanes Oxley Summary
The Sarbanes-Oxley Act, otherwise known as SOX, is a United States federal law designed to further protect shareholders and the public from general accounting fraud in public and private companies by improving the accuracy of corporate disclosures.
Momentum for this piece of legislation was provided by multiple financial scandals of the era, such as Enron and WorldCom, among others. SOX sets deadlines for corporate compliance and published rules on requirements for doing so.
SOX Compliance
According to the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, all public companies must store corporate electronic records, electronic messages, and other electronic business records for not less than five years. Failure to comply can result in fines, imprisonment, or both.
While SOX does not specify how an enterprise should store records or establish a set of best practices for doing so, it has contributed to the evolution of contemporary data security and protection practices. As a result, IT departments are now responsible for creating and maintaining an archive of corporate records including business records, communications, and electronic communications. Best practices for meeting compliance requirements for SOX ensure that financial data is accurate and protected against loss through security and protection.
How Precisely Can Help
Precisely supports the IT and cybersecurity side of SOX compliance, effectively managing security risks while responding quickly in the event of a breach. Precisely’s IT services ensure that proper controls are in place to prevent data breaches while supporting to tools to resolve incidents as they occur.
Precisely provides cybersecurity solutions that enable access to systems to be controlled so that unauthorized users cannot gain access to sensitive information. Accessibility also includes keeping servers and data centers in secure locations and making sure that password controls, lockout screens, and other measures are securely in place. Finally, Precisely supports annual SOX audit compliance requirements by providing evidential proof without compromising system repudiation.
The right software solution meets SOX audit requirements by monitoring data, enforcing governance policies, and logging user activity all without compromising system security.