The "Sarbanes-Oxley Act" is a federal law passed in 2002 in response to accounting and financial scandals in various U.S. corporations. The law added new corporate governance procedures for publicly traded corporations, added protections for corporate whistleblowers, and imposed stricter disclosure and certification requirements in financial statements. The law also created the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB), an entity that regulates and oversees public accounting firms. The law has been criticized as imposing significant additional compliance costs for corporations, especially smaller public companies.