Which label describes records that are retired for historical purposes?

• A. Active records
• B. Archived records
• C. Purged records
• D. Soft-deleted records

Answer: (D)

Records kept for long-term reference and potential future access, even though they aren’t used in daily operations, are described as archived records. Archiving moves items out of active workspaces but preserves them because they may be needed for historical insight, audits, or compliance. This is precisely what “retired for historical purposes” means: the information is preserved for the past rather than used in current processes.

Active records stay in current workflows and are frequently accessed for day-to-day tasks. Purged records are permanently removed, with no ability to recover them. Soft-deleted records are marked as deleted but still exist in the system and can often be restored; they aren’t yet treated as finalized historical records.