What term is used to describe the policies that govern the control of data to comply with legal standards?

The term that describes the policies governing the control of data to comply with legal standards is data retention. Data retention policies are crucial in ensuring that organizations appropriately manage their data according to legal and regulatory requirements. These policies outline how long different types of data should be kept, when they should be archived, and when they should be deleted or destroyed. Proper data retention practices not only help organizations meet compliance obligations but also mitigate risks related to data breaches and legal issues.

In contrast, data removal refers to the process of deleting or erasing data, which does not inherently involve compliance standards. Data preservation focuses on keeping data in its original state for future reference or legal purposes, often related to specific investigations or legal holds, but is not a broad policy framework like data retention. Data destruction pertains to the actual destruction of data when it is no longer needed, which is an aspect of the overall data life cycle but does not directly govern how data is controlled during its retention phase.