Fact · Voice privacy and security
The HIPAA Security Rule's technical safeguards include an audit controls standard: mechanisms that record and examine activity in systems that contain or use electronic protected health information.
Checked against its source on October 16, 2026
In the source's own words
“Implement hardware, software, and/or procedural mechanisms that record and examine activity in information systems that contain or use electronic protected health information.”
45 CFR 164.312: Technical safeguards (HIPAA Security Rule), U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (text reproduced by Cornell Legal Information Institute), 2013, 45 CFR 164.312(b).
Open the original- What it measures
- This is the standard, as written in the federal regulation text. A covered entity must put such a mechanism in place for systems that handle electronic health information.
- What it does not show
- The rule sets the standard and leaves the method to the covered entity. A consumer app's own logs are not the covered entity's audit trail unless the app is set up to provide one.