What does "test data management" involve?

Test data management involves the process of creating, maintaining, and protecting data that will be employed during the testing phases of software development. This is essential to ensure that the testing outcomes are accurate and reliable. Properly managed test data allows testers to simulate real-world scenarios and validate that the application behaves as expected across varying conditions.

Effective test data management ensures integrity, quality, and security of the dataset used during testing. It encompasses various activities including identifying data needs, generating synthetic data where real data cannot be used, implementing data masking techniques to protect sensitive information, and ensuring compliance with data regulations. The focus is on having the right data at the right time to facilitate thorough testing, which directly influences the quality of the software product being developed.

In contrast, the other options focus on different areas of project management or software development; they do not pertain specifically to preparing and handling test data, which is why they do not align with the concept of test data management.