Data traceability means the path followed by data in moving from one location (origin) to another (destination), various processes and transformation it undergoes while doing so before reaching its intended destination. We have already seen what data lineage is, so what is the difference between lineage and traceability?

Data lineage is often associated with metadata management and governance and has a difference to what data traceability means.

Data lineage is more technical in nature and shows each and every important step the data undergoes when going from origin to destination. This is a very important capability/resource for a technical team but doesn't give much sense to a non-technical business or other users in the enterprise.

Data traceability brings a non-technical layer on top of this to bring enough details in a non-technical manner to a variety of users in the enterprise.

There isn't a tool that we can suggest to do this automatically but this has to be maintained and managed as a holistic diagram and shared with different users in different departments, so that when they have to take any decisions for the enterprise, they are well aware of its repercussions to data and other department dependencies.