Data Integrity

Data Integrity(Q461671) is the maintenance of, and the assurance of the accuracy and consistency of, data over its entire life-cycle.

Data Integrity is how accurate and consistent the data is over its entire life-cycle. Data Integrity is a critical aspect to the design, implementation, and utilization of any system that store, process, or retrieve data. Data Integrity is often mistaken as Data Quality and/or Data Security. It needs Data Validation as the prerequisite, and the total opposite of Data Corruption.

In short, Data Integrity ensure the data is recorded exactly as intended; ensure that upon retrieval, the data is the same as when it was originally recorded. Any unintended changes of the data during the storing, retrieving, or processing operation, whether the change is done with malicious intent or not, or caused by unexpected hardware failure or even human error, is a failure on Data Integrity. If the change is done due to unauthorized accesses, it may also the failure of Data Security. These data loss, depending on how important the data, is very critical to any system.