International Organization for Standardization

The International Organization for Standardization (pronunciation: /ˌaɪsəʊ/), known as ISO, is an independent, non-governmental international organization that develops and publishes standards.

Etymology

The name ISO is derived from the Greek word 'isos', meaning equal. This name was chosen because the organization's founders decided to use a short, all-purpose term to describe the organization, avoiding the assortment of abbreviations that would result from the translation of "International Organization for Standardization" into different languages.

Related Terms

Standardization: The process of implementing and developing technical standards based on the consensus of different parties that include firms, users, interest groups, standards organizations and governments.
ISO 9000: A set of international standards on quality management and quality assurance developed to help companies effectively document the quality system elements to be implemented to maintain an efficient quality system.
ISO 14000: A family of standards related to environmental management that exists to help organizations minimize how their operations negatively affect the environment.
ISO 3166: A standard published by ISO that defines codes for the names of countries, dependent territories, special areas of geographical interest, and their principal subdivisions.