Sarbanes and Oxley: Your New Stakeholders

Determining whether legal and contractual issues apply to your development efforts isn't always simple. There may be some obvious factors: a well-regulated industry, service level agreements, and state or federal agency oversight. However, other factors may not be so obvious. The new Sarbanes-Oxley Act is largely legally untested, subjecting your company to unknown legal issues. You have an eCommerce site that stores credit card information. Your portal collects personal information. You produce proprietary software . . . and more. Covering legal, compliance, and audit throughout the QA process lifecycle, Elle Ringham discusses the right questions to ask and what to do with those answers. She provides guidelines for working with stakeholders, attorneys, and auditors. Take away audit templates, metrics to help you, and sample reports you may need to produce.

• Legal and compliance issues within QA scope
• Questions to ask and what to do with the answers you get
• Reporting the results of compliance tests