Set up auditing for a table or field in ServiceNow

 

Configuring auditing for a table or field in ServiceNow

Auditing in ServiceNow is crucial for maintaining data integrity, security, and compliance. Auditing at the field level, rather than the table level, is generally preferred as it allows for more granular control, reduced storage overhead, and better performance, while still providing valuable insights into data changes. Auditing at the table level can lead to unnecessary data storage and potentially impact performance. Therefor, it's necessary to enable the auditing at field level.

TLDR 

Configuration

Procedure 

1. Log in as administrator 
2. Navigate to System Definition > Dictionary [sys_dictionary] 
3. Find the record of the table whose type is 'Collection' 
4. Tick the Audit field of this record 
5. Enter 'audit_type=whitelist' in the Attributes field 
6. Save 
7. Find the record of the specific field of the table 
8. Enter 'audit=true' in the Attributes field 
9. Save 

Testing

The normal auditing mechanism will record in the auditing tables (such as sys_audit) changes in the value of a field on a specific table. 

For instance, with auditing of the State field on the Incident table enabled, changing the value of the State field on an Incident record might produce an audit record like the following:

Procedure:

1. Log in as administrator 
2. Navigate to Audit table [sys_audit] 
3. Find the record of the specific field of the table 
4. Analyse the audit record

How to audit a specific field of a table 

Resource: https://support.servicenow.com/kb?id=kb_article_view&sysparm_article=KB0685670 

How to use field inclusion list with table field auditing 

Resource: https://support.servicenow.com/kb?id=kb_article_view&sysparm_article=KB0724176 

Exclusion list Auditing - How to activate/deactivate auditing for a specific table or field 

Resource: https://support.servicenow.com/kb?id=kb_article_view&sysparm_article=KB0723730 

Use update sets to configure auditing for a table or specific fields.

Other resources:

• Varan explains auditing in ServiceNow
• https://www.servicenow.com/docs/bundle/yokohama-platform-security/page/administer/security/task/t_EnableAuditingForATable.html
• How to Enable Table Audits in ServiceNow: A Step-by-Step Guide
• Enable auditing on a field

That's a wrap!