Sarbanes-Oxley Act

Administered by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) starting in 2002, the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) regulates corporate financial records and provides penalties for their abuse. It defines the type of records that must be recorded and for how long. It also deals with falsification of data. Affecting data storage capacities and planning, Sarbanes-Oxley was enacted after the Enron and WorldCom scandals of the early 2000s. The bill was sponsored by Paul Sarbanes, Democratic Senator from Maryland and additionally authored before passage by Michael Oxley, Republican Senator from Ohio. See risk mitigation.