Retention Rule
An ILM rule in Information Retention Management (IRM)
of SAP NetWeaver Information Lifecycle Management (ILM)
is used to control the retention of data required by law.
You use ILM rules for the following purposes:
Restricting the retention period for data privacy reasons
Safeguarding the legally defined retention period for tax audit or product liability purposes.
For the destruction of Human Resources (HR) data for data privacy reasons, the aspect of restricting the retention period is relevant since for legal reasons it is mandatory that the data is destroyed once this period has been reached. Therefore, define the maximum retention period for an ILM rule for an ILM object or HR archiving object.
Structure
The following information is required for defining a retention rule:
Policy Category
Type of rules in the policy
The policy category
Retention Rule
(RTP
) is relevant for data destruction.Audit Area
Grouping of ILM objects from a business perspective
The HR archiving objects for the destruction of application data from Personnel Administration (PA) and Time Management (PT) are grouped in the audit area
HCM Data Privacy
(HCM_DP
). If an archiving object is not assigned to an audit area you cannot create retention rules for it.Object (ILM object)
Comprises all settings for applying ILM rules (for example, retention rules) to the instances of an ILM object (for example, absences). An HR archiving object (for example,
HRTIM_ABS
) that is to be used in ILM must be assigned to an ILM object (HRTIM_ABS
). To create destruction locks, an ILM object also comprises the assignment of the corresponding BOR objects.Policy origin
States from where the rules originate. Stating the policy origin is for documentation purposes only since it is not connected to any other function within IRM.
ExampleBDSG
for policies based on the German Data Protection ActASUG
orDSAG
for policies based on recommendations from SAP user groups
End of the example.Policy status
For a retention rule to be able to be evaluated for data destruction, the related policy must have the status Productive.
Rule-relevant fields
In Customizing for IRM, standard condition fields are defined for each ILM object, which you can use to define a retention rule. Since data destruction is subject to country-specific regulations due to data privacy reasons, Customizing of ILM objects for HR standard archiving objects contains the standard condition field
Country Grouping
(MOLGA
). Furthermore, other specific standard condition fields can be defined for each ILM object. When defining ILM rules, you can select on which of these fields your rule is to be based. ExampleIRM Customizing for the ILM object
HR: Addresses
(HRPA_ADRS
) contains the fieldsCountry Grouping
(MOLGA
) andSubtype
(SUBTYP
). You can use these fields to define a country-specific retention rule for the data for the address typeTemporary Residence
for all employees with the country grouping Germany (DE
).End of the example.Minimum/maximum retention period
In the case of a retention rule for data destruction, the maximum retention period is relevant since it is mandatory that the data is destroyed after this period has been reached. The retention period is defined together with the time base.
Time base
Unit for the minimum/maximum retention period (for example, year, month)
Start time
The start time (
Starts With
) defines as of when the retention period (for example,End of Year
orEnd of Data Record
) starts. In Customizing for IRM, in the standard SAP system,Allowed Start Times
are defined for each ILM object, which can be used to define a retention rule for this ILM object.
More Information
General Principles and Recommendations for Using Rules in IRM