An Audit Framework for Expert Systems

Expert systems moved from research laboratories to widespread use in the business world during the previous decade. Current data indicate that use will continue to increase in the foreseeable future. However, auditors have not comprehensively addressed the need for and feasibility of independent audits of these systems. This paper discusses factors that will soon create a demand for independent audits of expert systems. It then identifies a framework present in current professional standards that appears to be appropriate for proceeding with the auditing of expert systems. A hypothetical case is subsequently presented to illustrate one possibility of how measurement criteria, audit procedures and an audit report developed under these professional standards might appear. Potential practice problems and research issues are identified throughout the paper.     

PLANET: An Expert System for Audit Risk Assessment and Planning

PLANET is an expert system for audit risk assessment and audit test selection. At present it is undergoing worldwide field testing by Price Waterhouse audit teams. As a case study, PLANET illustrates a complex interplay of audit methodology issues and expert systems development techniques, and reinforces the validity of many of the widely reported lessons learned about successful expert systems development during the 1980s. However, the experience also challenges elements of this received wisdom while exposing special issues arising in the development of expert systems in the field of auditing.     

APX: An Integrated Knowledge-Based System to Support Audit Planning

Auditors who must express an opinion on the financial statements of publicly held enterprises must perform a series of risk assessments as the basis for selecting appropriate audit procedures to be performed. Although many auditing expert systems have been developed for individual components of the audit risk assessment process such as inherent and control risk assessment, none integrate these assessments to arrive at the ultimate objective of assessing the allowable level of detection risk which drives audit procedure selection. This paper discusses critical design concerns for audit planning expert systems in light of the integrated nature of the steps involved in the audit planning process. The design and development of an integrated audit planning expert system called APX (Audit Planning eXpert) is also discussed. A distinguishing feature of APX is that it not only performs the individual types of risk assessments but it also integrates the resulting assessments to arrive at allowable detection risk. The knowledge acquisition and system development process are described to illustrate some of the mechanics of developing such a system.     

审计专家系统的发展及其启示

作为审计判断辅助工具的审计专家系统是一个能够效仿人类专家决策能力的计算机系统,不但可以减少审计判断的主观性,提高审计判断的一致性进而提高审计判断的质量,而且可以提高审计效率。20世纪80年代以来,专家系统引起了几乎所有科学领域的关注,并在许多领域得到了应用,审计专家系统则受到了各大国际会计公司的重视本文拟就此作简要介绍。审计专家系统的发展情况审计是一个专业性非常强的领域。在审计人员作出审计判断的过程中,既需要审计人员具有扎实的专业知识,也要求其具有丰富的实践经验,符合上述要求的专业人员我们称之为专家。一般认…     

A Global Approach to Identifying Expert System Applications in Compensation Practice

This paper reports the results of a study to determine the most cost-effective expert system application for the compensation practice of a large employee benefits consulting firm. The purpose of the expert system would be to help assure quality and consistency in practice and to assist in the training of less experienced experts. The study utilized a questionnaire to solicit input from experts in several locations. The questionnaire included a comprehensive listing of firm compensation tasks. Evaluation characteristics selected for the study emphasized business-related characteristics. Because of adverse economic circumstances in the consulting firm, the decision concerning an initial expert systems application was deferred.     

缩小审计期望值差的办法

审计期望值差是审计研究中的重要问题,事关审计市场供求发展。此文以“审计七个基本前提假设”为基础,探讨了缩小审计期望值差的一些办法。     

审计计划阶段和报告阶段应关注的特殊事项

一、利用其他主体的工作利用其他主体的工作主要分为两种情况:一种是利用专家的工作。当注册会计师遇到某些特殊资产、特殊业务时,单凭会计师自身的力量通常无法胜任,这时就需要利用专家的知识、经验和判断,获取必要的审计证据,来完成对某一事项的认定。另一种是利用其他注册会计师的工作。当注册会计师作为主审注册会计师时,就会遇到利用其他注册会计师工作的可能,需要对其他注册会计师的工作结果进行查询、审阅等来获取相关审计证据。这两种情形,在特殊行业、特殊业务和集团审计的情况下较常遇到,作为注册会计师就需要未雨绸缪,及早规划,…     

A Hybrid-Based Expert System for Personal Pension Planning in the UK

While advanced computing technology, and particularly the use of artificial intelligence in the form of expert systems, could not necessarily be said to be common in the US financial planning domain, it is certainly not unheard of. This situation is significantly different from that found in the comparable UK domain. This paper is based on a project to look at the use of computing technology to support the role of the personal financial adviser in the UK—a domain in which little published research work has been undertaken. It briefly describes the current UK marketplace and details the construction of a small hybrid-based expert system, built to support the selection of personal pension plans, to illustrate the inherent value in developing such technology in this domain. The paper discusses the benefits of using hybrid representational techniques as opposed to single representations in creating an expert system in a financial planning domain.     

An Analysis of Potential Legal Liability Incurred Through Audit Expert Systems

The introduction of expert systems technology into the audit environment has opened a new avenue of auditor legal liability. This paper examines the potential impact expert systems will have on auditor liability. The presentation of this new avenue of auditors' legal liability explores both the potential for litigation under failure of auditor/expert system collaboration to yield prudent decisions and the failure to use an available expert system. The risks evolving from failure to use an available expert system include the possibility that the system could be used against the auditor in the courtroom. While case law will ultimately determine the bounds of this liability, this paper acquaints the reader with the important legal issues involved and the varied outcomes that could emerge. It should also be noted that while the specific example presented in this paper relates to the audit profession, the legal concepts are of equivalent concern to other professions enduring broad implementation of expert systems.     

An Application of Data Envelopment Analysis to the Evaluation of Audit Risk

This article demonstrates how data envelopment analysis can be used to weight audit risk factors. Data from a previously reported study applying the analytic hierarchy process is used to facilitate a comparison between these two methods. Data envelopment analysis (DEA) has several advantages, including the ability to accommodate a range of expert opinions on the importance of a specific risk factor, rather than using the median or mean value. DEA can be used to provide high-risk and low-risk assessments and provides benchmark audit units from which other units can be evaluated.     

The Business Risk Audit Approach and Audit Production Efficiency

Essentially, this study asks: Does the business risk audit (BRA) approach increase audit production efficiency? To answer this question empirically, direct and indirect tests are employed using proprietary, working paper data from the larger clients of a major Australian public sector audit provider and an efficiency frontier analytic methodology, data envelopment analysis (DEA). Results based on this proprietary, audit hours data for audit engagements carried out just after BRA approach implementation show that they have high levels of production efficiency and are risk-adjusted, with no significant difference in production efficiency between higher and lower business risk audit engagements. Results based on audit fees data for audit engagements carried out shortly before and after BRA approach implementation show that overall production efficiency significantly improves. Importantly, while this improvement is significant for lower-risk audit engagements, there is no significant improvement for higher-risk audit engagements. In the context of this study's research site, this is consistent with the BRA approach addressing inefficiencies created when lower-risk audit engagements are being over-audited. That is, the BRA approach can result in both risk-adjusted and more efficiently produced audits. With the re-emergence of the BRA approach in the literature and in practice, this study provides empirical evidence to support the claim that this audit approach can lead to ‘creating auditing efficiencies’ (Bell et al., 1997, p. 1).     

注册会计师审计制度:市场经济体制的一项基础设施

注册会计师审计制度源于防止资本交易舞弊的共有信念,是弥补价格机制失灵的经济监督制度,提供准公共物品,执行着维护社会公共利益的职能,因而具有准政府性职能.因此,注册会计师审计制度并不是一种普通的中介制度,而是市场治理机制的重要组成部分,是资本市场的保护机制,是整个市场经济体制的一项基础设施.     

政府审计在国有资产审计监督体系中的作用

我国当前的国有资产审计监督体系包括内部审计监督、社会审计监督和政府审计监督等三个层次。国有资产审计监督是我国国家审计机关的法定审计范围,在对国有资产审计监督方面具有先天的优势,应加强政府审计在国有资产审计监督体系中的主导作用。     

The Definition and Diffusion of Expert Systems: An Empirical Survey of Belgian External Audit Firms

This paper reports empirical results on the definition and diffusion of expert systems (ESs). The findings are based on a questionnaire that was sent to Belgian external audit firms in June 1993. Audit firms were chosen as the questionnaire's target group because another part of the survey was aimed at gathering information concerning the audit of ESs. The definition section deals with the importance of several ES characteristics as seen by the sample of practitioners. Results are compared with opinions from theoretical literature and reveal significant differences. The section on diffusion of ESs is intended to provide an indication of the extent of development and usage of ESs in todays business life. On the basis of the sample of audit firms that reported on their auditees' situations, diffusion rates are rather low. Each of these sections is introduced by a short literature review. As both sections are largely based on the results of a survey, relevant details are included in the first section.     

信息化生态环境下企业内部控制框架研究

本文在对信息化生态环境下企业内部控制变化趋势进行研究的基础上提出:处于信息化生态环境中的企业应针对经营管理中面临的诸如信息系统规划建设中的治理风险、软件中内控机制漏洞风险、系统运转中的不稳定性风险、操作中的人为风险等许多新的风险,及时引进和建设与此相适应的内部控制体系,借鉴诸如CO-BIT、ITIL、ISO/IEC17799、PRINCE2、eSAC等先进的内控框架构建信息系统环境中的有效内控机制。     

央行IT审计评价指标体系研究

本文结合目前央行信息系统审计的特点和国际准则的先进思想,以COBIT标准为基础,研究基于COBIT模型的央行IT审计框架和评价指标体系.     

Audit Fees and Deeds of Cross Guarantee: An Empirical Evaluation

Since 1985, directors of Australian corporate groups have had the opportunity to execute a regulatory financing instrument, currently described as a deed of cross guarantee (DXG), between a holding company and one or more subsidiaries. This unique Australian regulatory intervention was advanced and justified on the basis that relieving subsidiaries from financial reporting requirements with associated cross‐guaranteeing debt obligations would reduce the regulatory burden on groups of companies, and subsequently reduce audit and administration costs. Given the claims of regulators' and others in the business community, this paper examines whether, ceteris paribus, the DXG has a significant mitigating effect on audit fee determination. Specifically, the study evaluates whether a particular engagement attribute decreases audit complexity and subsequently audit risk and audit fees. After controlling for size and group structure complexity of the auditee, the study finds that first‐time adopters of a DXG pay less in audit fees relative to non‐DXG groups, but there is lack of evidence to support ongoing audit fee savings from having a DXG in place. On the contrary, results show that a group with an established DXG pays much higher audit fees, which may be a consequence of the DXG introducing added complexity to the audit. The study also contributes to the methodological development of the standard audit fee model, particularly for the Australian context.     

An Exploratory Analysis of Accounting Expert System Abstracts

A classification scheme was developed to show trends and categorize articles on accounting expert systems (AES) which were written during the period 1977 to 1989 and abstracted in Brown (1989). The analysis shows that the number of articles on AES has been burgeoning since 1985. The number of introductory articles has declined, as authors have assumed reader familiarity with expert systems concepts. Research in all areas of accounting has been increasing and a wide range of issues in AES has been covered, but with an increasing emphasis on tax and auditing, perhaps due to the influence of large management consulting/accounting firms. Finally, for most subcategories within AES, the focus of the articles along the ES dimension has been on the prototyping and working model stages of development.     

财务报表审计中对信息系统控制风险的评价

随着信息技术的进步，企业的经营模式和业务都发生了巨大的变化，财务报表审计所面对的审计对象的生产环境发生了很大的变化，很多企业在报表的编制过程中采用了IT技术，都给财务报表审计带来了很大的冲击。本对财务报表审计中对信息系统控制风险的评价的目的、步骤、内容等问题进行了探讨。     

重构商业银行运营体系的方法与实践

不仅银行的交易要通过运营体系来完成,而且客户也要通过运营体系来获得服务,可以说,运营是商业银行存在的基础.商业银行要在降低成本、改善服务和控制风险的基础上实现差异化的竞争优势,就要求商业银行必须用产业化、柔性化和服务化的模式来重构运营体系.为此,本文给出了重构商业银行运营体系的方法及模型,并且用案例展示了运用该方法来重构商业银行结算业务运营体系的实践,通过该方法,案例银行在运作安全、改善服务、提高业务吞吐量方面均取得显著成效.