Towards generating a data integrity standard

The tremendous growth in size, complexity and value of the organization's data resources has given rise to an urgent need for a data integrity standard that will provide a consensus definition, a common measure and a set of tools for evaluating the various models and mechanisms in this domain. This paper attempts to pave the way for such a data integrity standard. It discusses various definitions of data integrity and indicates the one that best serves as a common definition. It then provides a description and assessment of two prominent data integrity models: the Biba model, and the Clark-Wilson model. Next, a framework for evaluating these models is proposed and operationalized. The final section discusses conclusions and makes some practical recommendations that derive from the comparison of the models.