Wiktionary
n. 1 The practice of restricting entrance to a property, a building, or a room to authorized persons. 2 In technology, permitting or denying the use of a particular resource.
Wikipedia
In the fields of access control is the selective restriction of access to a place or other resource. The act of accessing may mean consuming, entering, or using. Permission to access a resource is called authorization.
Locks and login credentials are two analogous mechanisms of access control.
Usage examples of "access control".
How to hack a Windows Registry -- which is where access control on Windows-based LANs, intranets and Internet and Webs servers are hidden!
Proxy Server then checks the IP address against the access control applied by the Administrator.
His fingers danced across the access control, tapping out the code for an emergency jettison.
Suddenly his monitor lit up with an access control list warning message.
In front of the seal are ten Access Control Terminals, watched over by a central security command post.
Inside was a metal locker, corroded, with an ancient access control panel on it.