FRAUD AUDITING AND FORENSIC ACCOUNTING With the responsibility of detecting and preventing fraud falling heavily on the accounting profession, every accountant needs to recognize fraud and learn the tools and strategies necessary to catch it in time. Providing valuable information to those responsible for dealing with prevention and discovery of financial deception, Fraud Auditing and Forensic Accounting, Fourth Edition helps accountants develop an investigative eye toward both internal and external fraud and provides tips for coping with fraud when it is found to have occurred. Completely updated and revised, the new edition presents: Brand-new chapters devoted to fraud response as well as to the physiological aspects of the fraudster A closer look at how forensic accountants get their job done More about Computer-Assisted Audit Tools (CAATs) and digital forensics Technological aspects of fraud auditing and forensic accounting Extended discussion on fraud schemes Case studies demonstrating industry-tested methods for dealing with fraud, all drawn from a wide variety of actual incidents Inside this book, you will find step-by-step keys to fraud investigation and the most current methods for dealing with financial fraud within your organization. Written by recognized experts in the field of white-collar crime, this Fourth Edition provides you, whether you are a beginning forensic accountant or an experienced investigator, with industry-tested methods for detecting, investigating, and preventing financial schemes.
Since publication of the first edition, the level of interest in fraud accounting and auditing continues to increase. The book focuses on investigation, detection, documentation, and prevention of accounting and stock frauds, employee theft, and embezzlement. Also provides detailed techniques and strategies.
A powerful new tool for all forensic accountants, or anyone whoanalyzes data that may have been altered Benford's Law gives the expected patterns of the digits in thenumbers in tabulated data such as town and city populations orMadoff's fictitious portfolio returns. Those digits, in unaltereddata, will not occur in equal proportions; there is a large biastowards the lower digits, so much so that nearly one-half of allnumbers are expected to start with the digits 1 or 2. Thesepatterns were originally discovered by physicist Frank Benford inthe early 1930s, and have since been found to apply to alltabulated data. Mark J. Nigrini has been a pioneer in applyingBenford's Law to auditing and forensic accounting, even before hisgroundbreaking 1999 Journal of Accountancy article introducing thisuseful tool to the accounting world. In Benford's Law, Nigrinishows the widespread applicability of Benford's Law and itspractical uses to detect fraud, errors, and other anomalies. Explores primary, associated, and advanced tests, all describedwith data sets that include corporate payments data and electiondata Includes ten fraud detection studies, including vendor fraud,payroll fraud, due diligence when purchasing a business, and taxevasion Covers financial statement fraud, with data from Enron, AIG,and companies that were the target of hedge fund short sales Looks at how to detect Ponzi schemes, including data on Madoff,Waxenberg, and more Examines many other applications, from the Clinton tax returnsand the charitable gifts of Lehman Brothers to tax evasion andnumber invention Benford's Law has 250 figures and uses 50 interestingauthentic and fraudulent real-world data sets to explain boththeory and practice, and concludes with an agenda and directionsfor future research. The companion website adds additionalinformation and resources.
Praise for the Fourth Edition of Fraud Auditing and Forensic Accounting "Tommie and Aaron Singleton have made important updates to a book I personally rely very heavily upon: Fraud Auditing and Forensic Accounting (FAFA). In the newest edition, they take difficult topics and explain them in straightforward actionable language. All my students benefitted from reading the third edition of the FAFA to better understand the issues and area of fraud and forensic accounting. With their singular focus on understandability and practicality, this Fourth Edition of the book makes a very important contribution for academics, researchers, practitioners, and students. Bravo!"—Dr. Timothy A. Pearson, Director, Division of Accounting, West Virginia University, Executive Director, Institute for Fraud Prevention "Finally someone has written a book that combines fraud examination and forensic accounting. The authors have clearly explained both in their earlier edition and now they have enhanced the first with additional materials. The order in which the material is presented is easy to grasp and logically follows the 'typical' fraud examination from the awareness that something is wrong to the court case. The explanatory materials presented aid this effort by being both well placed within the book and relevant to the narrative." —Dr. Douglas E. Ziegenfuss, Chair and Professor, Department of Accounting, Old Dominion University "Fraud Auditing and Forensic Accounting is a masterful compilation of the concepts found in this field. The organization of the text with the incorporation of actual cases, facts, and figures provides a logical and comprehensive basis for learning the intricacies of fraud examination and forensic accounting. The authors successfully blend the necessary basics with advanced principles in a manner that makes the book an outstanding resource for students and professionals alike."—Ralph Q. Summerford, President of Forensic/Strategic Solutions, PC
Forensic Accounting and Fraud Examination introduces students and professionals to the world of fraud detection and deterrence, providing a solid foundation in core concepts and methods for both public and private sector environments. Aligned with the National Institute of Justice (NIJ) model curriculum, this text provides comprehensive and up-to-date coverage of asset misappropriation, corruption, fraud, and other topics a practicing forensic accountant encounters on a daily basis. A focus on real-world practicality employs current examples and engaging case studies to reinforce comprehension, while in-depth discussions clarify technical concepts in an easily relatable style. End of chapter material and integrated IDEA and Tableau software cases introduces students to the powerful, user-friendly tools accounting professionals use to maximize auditing and analytic capabilities, detect fraud, and comply with documentation requirements, and coverage of current methods and best practices provides immediate relevancy to real-world scenarios. Amidst increased demand for forensic accounting skills, even for entry-level accountants, this text equips students with the knowledge and skills they need to successfully engage in the field.
A must-have reference for every business professional, Forensic Accounting and Fraud Investigation for Non-Experts, Second Edition is a necessary tool for those interested in understanding how financial fraud occurs and what to do when you find or suspect it within your organization. With comprehensive coverage, it provides insightful advice on where an organization is most susceptible to fraud.
Recent catastrophic business failures have caused some to rethinkthe value of the audit, with many demanding that auditors take moreresponsibility for fraud detection. This book provides forensicaccounting specialists?experts in uncovering fraud?with newcoverage on the latest PCAOB Auditing Standards, the ForeignCorrupt Practices Act, options fraud, as well as fraud in China andits implications. Auditors are equipped with the necessarypractical aids, case examples, and skills for identifyingsituations that call for extended fraud detection procedures.
Become the forensic analytics expert in your organization using effective and efficient data analysis tests to find anomalies, biases, and potential fraud—the updated new edition Forensic Analytics reviews the methods and techniques that forensic accountants can use to detect intentional and unintentional errors, fraud, and biases. This updated second edition shows accountants and auditors how analyzing their corporate or public sector data can highlight transactions, balances, or subsets of transactions or balances in need of attention. These tests are made up of a set of initial high-level overview tests followed by a series of more focused tests. These focused tests use a variety of quantitative methods including Benford’s Law, outlier detection, the detection of duplicates, a comparison to benchmarks, time-series methods, risk-scoring, and sometimes simply statistical logic. The tests in the new edition include the newly developed vector variation score that quantifies the change in an array of data from one period to the next. The goals of the tests are to either produce a small sample of suspicious transactions, a small set of transaction groups, or a risk score related to individual transactions or a group of items. The new edition includes over two hundred figures. Each chapter, where applicable, includes one or more cases showing how the tests under discussion could have detected the fraud or anomalies. The new edition also includes two chapters each describing multi-million-dollar fraud schemes and the insights that can be learned from those examples. These interesting real-world examples help to make the text accessible and understandable for accounting professionals and accounting students without rigorous backgrounds in mathematics and statistics. Emphasizing practical applications, the new edition shows how to use either Excel or Access to run these analytics tests. The book also has some coverage on using Minitab, IDEA, R, and Tableau to run forensic-focused tests. The use of SAS and Power BI rounds out the software coverage. The software screenshots use the latest versions of the software available at the time of writing. This authoritative book: Describes the use of statistically-based techniques including Benford’s Law, descriptive statistics, and the vector variation score to detect errors and anomalies Shows how to run most of the tests in Access and Excel, and other data analysis software packages for a small sample of the tests Applies the tests under review in each chapter to the same purchasing card data from a government entity Includes interesting cases studies throughout that are linked to the tests being reviewed. Includes two comprehensive case studies where data analytics could have detected the frauds before they reached multi-million-dollar levels Includes a continually-updated companion website with the data sets used in the chapters, the queries used in the chapters, extra coverage of some topics or cases, end of chapter questions, and end of chapter cases. Written by a prominent educator and researcher in forensic accounting and auditing, the new edition of Forensic Analytics: Methods and Techniques for Forensic Accounting Investigations is an essential resource for forensic accountants, auditors, comptrollers, fraud investigators, and graduate students.
Black money and financial crime are emerging global phenomena. During the last few decades, corrupt financial practices were increasingly being monitored in many countries around the globe. Among a large number of problems is a lack of general awareness about all these issues among various stakeholders including researchers and practitioners. The Handbook of Research on Theory and Practice of Financial Crimes is a critical scholarly research publication that provides comprehensive research on all aspects of black money and financial crime in individual, organizational, and societal experiences. The book further examines the implications of white-collar crime and practices to enhance forensic audits on financial fraud and the effects on tax enforcement. Featuring a wide range of topics such as ethical leadership, cybercrime, and blockchain, this book is ideal for policymakers, academicians, business professionals, managers, IT specialists, researchers, and students.
Practical examples, sample reports, best practices and recommendations to help you deter, detect, and prevent financial statement fraud Financial statement fraud (FSF) continues to be a major challenge for organizations worldwide. Financial Statement Fraud: Prevention and Detection, Second Edition is a superior reference providing you with an up-to-date understanding of financial statement fraud, including its deterrence, prevention, and early detection. You will find A clear description of roles and responsibilities of all those involved in corporate governance and the financial reporting process to improve the quality, reliability and transparency of financial information. Sample reports, examples, and documents that promote a real-world understanding of incentives, opportunities, and rationalizations Emerging corporate governance reforms in the post-SOX era, including provisions of the SOX Act, global regulations and best practices, ethical considerations, and corporate governance principles Practical examples and real-world "how did this happen" discussions that provide valuable insight for corporate directors and executives, auditors, managers, supervisory personnel and other professionals saddled with anti-fraud responsibilities Expert advice from the author of Corporate Governance and Ethics and coauthor of the forthcoming Wiley textbook, White Collar Crime, Fraud Examination and Financial Forensics Financial Statement Fraud, Second Edition contains recommendations from the SEC Advisory Committee to reduce the complexity of the financial reporting process and improving the quality of financial reports.
