Which approach supports maintaining a stable identifier across address changes in multiple systems?

Which approach supports maintaining a stable identifier across address changes in multiple systems?

• A. Change existing country codes in-place and retroactively modify all addresses.
• B. Maintain stable IDs, implement a country-code mapping layer, and propagate updates through CDC-driven reconciliations.
• C. Ignore changes to country codes and continue using the old values.
• D. Delete all addresses when a code changes.

Answer: (B)

The key idea is to keep a single, stable identity for an address across systems even as country codes or other attributes change. By anchoring all systems to a stable ID, references remain consistent instead of being disrupted by evolving codes. Adding a country-code mapping layer lets each system interpret codes in its own context while the underlying identifier stays the same, so changes don’t force widespread renaming or re-linking. Change Data Capture drives reconciliations across systems, automatically propagating updates from the source to downstream systems, which maintains alignment over time and supports traceability. This combination prevents data drift, avoids destructive edits, and removes the need to retroactively modify many records. In contrast, altering codes in place would destabilize references, ignoring changes leads to stale data, and deleting addresses wastes history and breaks relationships.