Record
Recorded information, in any form or medium, created or received by an organization in the course of business and kept as evidence of its activities, decisions, and obligations.
The concept of a record is the starting point for the entire discipline of records management. What distinguishes a record from ordinary information is its evidential value: a record documents that something happened — a decision was made, a transaction occurred, an obligation was incurred.
Records can take any form: paper documents, emails, database entries, spreadsheets, photographs, maps, audio and video, and text messages. The medium is irrelevant; the content and context are what matter. A record is also expected to have integrity — to remain complete and unaltered — and enough context (metadata) to be understood and trusted over time.
Because records carry evidential weight, they are subject to retention requirements and to controlled disposition at the end of their useful life, distinguishing them from a non-record.