Certified Information Systems Auditor 2025 – 400 Free Practice Questions to Pass the Exam

The most suitable tool for an IS auditor analyzing audit trails on critical servers to discover potential anomalies is trend/variance detection tools. These tools are specifically designed to identify deviations from established patterns or models, making them ideal for detecting unusual activities or anomalies in audit data. By tracking changes over time, trend/variance detection tools can highlight unexpected behavior that might indicate security breaches, fraud, or operational issues.

In contrast, automated compliance checkers are primarily focused on ensuring adherence to regulatory standards and policies rather than detecting specific anomalies within audit trails. Risk assessment matrices are useful for evaluating and prioritizing risks but do not provide the granularity needed for anomaly detection in actual data logs. Database management systems, while important for managing and querying data, do not have the inherent capabilities necessary for analyzing trends or spotting anomalies in audit trails specifically. Thus, trend/variance detection tools stand out as the most effective option for this type of analysis.