Audit Logging

Kind: mechanism

Layer: Observability

Record: architecture:audit-logging

Severity: contextual

Scope: security, compliance, data mutation

Canonical: Ontology

A mechanism that appends an immutable record of each sensitive operation, naming the actor, the action, the target and the time.

Listed in Architecture principles, after Auditability and before Traceability.

Requires

• Actor
• Action
• Timestamp
• Target

Reinforces

• Auditability
• Traceability

Enables

• Forensics

Conflicts with

• Untracked Mutation

In tension with

• Privacy

Tensions

• Audit Logging / Privacy

Violated by

• Opaque Mutation

Refactored by

• Append-Only Log

Severity

• contextual

Category

• Observability / Auditability / Traceability

Refactors

• Unobservable Failure

Linked from

• Detect, log, fix
• Anti-patterns
• Observability / Auditability / Traceability
• Observability / Auditability / Traceability
• Severity levels
• The resolutions