Conducting and managing sampled information audits for the determination of database accuracy

摘要

A computer-based method and apparatus for auditing electronic information, most often a database. A database auditor of the present invention conducts an audit as specified by a user-defined project. The project indicates focus groups, filters, skews and whether to count blank entries. The database auditor selects a sample representative of the view of the database described by the project. It presents the sample to the user in a standardized set of reports or on-line forms. The user then determines the number errors contained in the sample and communicates these data to the database auditor. The database auditor uses the error data to calculate the accuracy of the database, as well as the accuracies of the individual fields and focus groups, and to presents these accuracies to the user. Finally, the database auditor charts areas of accuracy and inaccuracy by field and focus group and indicates which inaccuracies are due to process errors and which are due to user errors. The indication of whether the source of inaccuracy is inherent in the process (i.e., a process error) or caused by human negligence (i.e., a user error) enables the user to efficiently and effectively correct database inaccuracies.