Pastpermission

Pastpermission is a coined term used primarily in discussions of information governance, access control, and consent management to describe permissions or authorizations that were granted in the past. It emphasizes the temporal aspect of rights, distinguishing historical allowances from current or future approvals. Because it is not a standardized term in major legal or security frameworks, its exact meaning can vary by context.

In practice, pastpermission can refer to access rights that originated under an earlier policy or agreement and that may continue to apply for a defined period, even as policy terms evolve. For example, a user might have been granted temporary access to a data repository under a prior version of a policy; depending on organizational rules, that access could persist until expiry or be subject to retroactive revocation. The concept is often used to support auditability, traceability, and compliance by recording the history of permissions granted over time.

Pastpermission is sometimes contrasted with current consent or present authorization, highlighting how historical rights interact with or constrain new governance decisions. Issues that arise include determining when pastpermissions expire, how they interact with revocation or policy updates, and how they should be documented in access-control logs and compliance reports.

See also: consent, authorization, access control, data governance, auditability.