What is Control (in governance)?
In governance, a control is a specific measure, process or technical safeguard that reduces a risk or meets a requirement, such as mandatory human review before a decision, access restrictions or bias testing before release. Each control should have an owner, a way to test it and linked evidence.
Controls are what turn policy and obligations into action. A single control can address several obligations across laws and standards, so mapping controls to requirements avoids duplicate work. Testing whether a control operates as intended is separate from defining it.