What is an Information Asset?

Information can be regarded as an Asset when it is used by an organization and adds value.

The information should be available and adaptable to changing user needs regardless of why, how, where and when it was originally created and independent of what, how, where and when it was intended to be used.

Information Assets contribute and add to an organizations value, due to careful management, storage, improvement, updates, changes, sharing and reuse over time. Information becomes an economical valuable asset because of the collected economical value it contributes with over time is higher then the costs for creation and life cycle management. Information Assets are different from other assets since information-assets don’t lose value or disappear when it is used.

By theory, an Information Asset can be used by any number of times, by any number of users, without losing in value. On the other hand, Information Assets can loose their values extremely fast. If information has no meaning or use, or if it's not actual, updated, accurate, or if it's not delivered in time, or if we can't trust the information anymore - then it has little value.

Information Assets are strategic when they fulfill strategic needs. Certain information is of strategic importance for an organization. A commercial company should have access to all information on their products and customers; government organizations must have information on legislation, economy, intelligence, geography, etc. An organization’s strategic information can be analyzed by looking at the interactions between the functions within the organization and external parties.

Information Assets can be measured, controlled and managed by using and creating adapted metrics from information dimensions such as:

• Source related dimensions; objectivity, factual, accuracy and consistency
• User dimensions; timeliness, completeness, value added, semantics, accessibility and understandability
• Maintainer dimensions; syntax, structure, representation, portability, uniqueness, security

Information Assets must be properly identified as important enterprise resources, and included in the accounting procedures, such as financial and annual reports. Managing and annually report on corporate information assets are today required for government and industry enterprises by various legislation and trade regulation, such as:

• Publicly traded companies must adhere to the Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP), and the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) related regulations and commensurate controls. Companies are committed to integrity in the reporting to shareholders and the prevention of insider trading. Corporations are committed to protect the privacy of personnel related information and they strive for individual accountability with information assets.
• Government organizations must abide to national legislation and regulation. For US federal (state and local) agencies must all abide to the Clinger-Cohen Act, to introduce an IT and Information Governance. The Federal Information Security Management Act, or FISMA requires federal agency compliance with information security best practices by mandating that federal security executives must follow stringent accountability measures. Under FISMA, the Office of Management & Budget is charged with setting policies, standards and guidelines for every agency's information security.