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As a result, the AICPA issued Statement on Auditing Procedure (SAP) No. 1 in October 1939 and it required that auditors inspect inventories and confirm receivables. Consequently, auditors became responsible for auditing the business entity itself rather than simply relying upon management verification routines.

First, in 1961 Felix Kaufman wrote Electronic Data Processing and Auditing. The book compares auditing around and through the computer. Historically, auditing around the computer entails traditional manual procedures in which the existence of automated equipment is ignored. As such, the computer is treated as a black box. In this context, auditors rely upon physical inputs to and outputs from automated devices and do not concern themselves with how processing actually occurs within the system(s). Conversely, auditing through the computer involves actual use of computer systems in testing both controls and transactions. Finally, auditing with the computer entails direct evaluation of computer software, hardware, and processes. Consequently, auditing through the computer or with the computer is able to provide a much higher level of assurance when contrasted with auditing around the computer.

Although some aspects of the traditional audit will continue to hold value, the audit of the future provides opportunities to increase the use of automated tools and remains a key for offering improved assurances relative to the responsible management and utilization of stakeholder assets.

As previously mentioned, basic CAATS contain capabilities to enhance audit effectiveness and efficiency. However, they do not operate on a 24/7 basis and therefore fail to construct a truly continuous auditing environment whereby exceptions and anomalies may be identified as they occur. Alternatively stated, they do not work with real-time or close to real-time data streams and, thus, are not able to address questionable events such as potential fraud or irregularities in an optimized fashion. Cangemi (2010) argues that, given the recent advances in business technologies, the continuing emphasis on the backward looking audit is simply an outdated philosophy. Instead, he believes that real-time solutions are needed.

Future audit approaches would likely require auditors, regulators, and standards setters to make significant adjustments. Such adjustments might include (1) changes in the timing and frequency of the audit, (2) increased education in technology and analytic methods, (3) adoption of full population examination instead of sampling, (4) re-examination of concepts such as materiality and independence, and (5) mandating the provisioning of the audit data standard. Auditors would need to possess substantial technical and analytical skills

The primary goal of external auditing is to determine the extent to which the organization adheres to managerial policies, procedures, and requirements. The independent or external auditor is not an employee of the organization. He or she performs an examination with the objective of issuing a report containing an opinion on a client's financial statements. The attest function of external auditing refers to the auditor's expression of an opinion on a company's financial statements. The typical independent audit leads to an attestation regarding the fairness and dependability of the statements. This is communicated to the officials of the audited entity in the form of a written report accompanying the statements (an oral presentation of findings may sometimes be requested as well).

The IEEE standard for software development defines an audit as “an independent evaluation of conformance of software products and processes to applicable regulations, standards, guidelines, plans, specifications, and procedures”

This is a repeatedly observed phenomenon in tax compliance auditing, where several international surveys of tax compliance demonstrate that a fixed and vetted tax audit methodology is one of the most effective strategies to convince companies to respect audit results and pay their full taxes

Complex systems tend to drift toward unsafe conditions unless constant vigilance is maintained [42]. It is the sum of the tiny probabilities of individual events that matters in complex systems—if this grows without bound, the probability of catastrophe goes to one. The Borel-Cantelli Lemmas are formalizations of this statistical phenomenon [13],

Failure Modes and Effects Analysis (FMEA), methodical and systematic risk management approach that examines a proposed design or technology for foreseeable failures [72]. The main purpose of a FMEA is to define, identify and eliminate potential failures or problems in different products, designs, systems and services.