In access control, which term describes recording user activity for auditing?

• A. Authentication
• B. Authorization
• C. Access control
• D. Accounting

Answer: (D)

Recording user activity for auditing is accounting. Accounting covers logging what a user did, when they did it, and from where, creating an audit trail that supports accountability and incident investigation. Authentication is about proving identity, authorization determines what rights that identity has, and access control is the policy and mechanisms enforcing those rights. None of those primarily focus on maintaining the activity logs that enable audits; accounting is specifically about that record-keeping. For example, it logs login events, file access, commands executed, and timestamps to allow traceability and post-incident analysis.