Week 6 - Civil Law and Forensic Investigation

Week 6

The common criticism of expert witnesses including forensic accountants is that they are overly partisan and fail to provide the court with a neutral or independent opinion. Previous cases had indicated judges are getting frustrated when there is deliberate partisanship. (Keegan v. Minneapolis and St. Louis R.R., 1899)   This could be drawn from my experience where I could have 'acquaintances or friends' to help me and provide evidence in that assists me in situations. To prevent such partisanship to occur I think a few strategies could be implemented.
Firstly since the expert witnesses act most as an advocate for their client's case, the court should implement a procedure rule where forensic accountant expert witnesses should be appointed by the court and declare the duty of a forensic accountant expert witness in relation to the court. The implementation would diminish the level of bias that may occur since they are not acting on behalf of a client, and also they have a duty of care to perform in court (refer to APES 215). Secondly, if parties are required to seek expert evidence in trial, they are required to seek directions from the court, and its the courts discretion to determine whether it  should be required.

By implementing this rule into the Uniform Civil Procedure Rules in Queensland, I believe this will not only prevent partisanship but will enable expert witnesses like forensic accountants to provide more effective evidence for the court.

Reference: 

Keegan v Minneapolis & St Louis RR, 78 NW 965

Uniform Civil Procedure Rules 2005 (NSW)

Week 5 - Criminal Fraud and the Law

Week 5

Again drawing the experience from me studying law, crimes like cyber crime requires more guidance and strict or vicarious liability need to be enforced to minimise such crime. Prime example would be the case Kennison v Daire, where the court was able to explore offences committed by the use of computer technology, however, the prosecution found it difficult to prove such offence. Furthermore, it remains uncertain as to whether our current legislative systems contains all the computer offences or technical definitions that prevents cyber crime from happening. Computer crime must now confront obfuscation crime tools used to commit computer abuse such as dynamic domain name hosting, encryption, fast-flux and double fast-flux, malware, onion routing, peer-topeer (P2P) channels, Trojans and virtual private network services. (The Report of the Inquiry into Cyber Crime, 2010.)

For recommendations, I suggest Australia should first implements principles in relation to cyber crime and only to be of guidance for courts to apply if assistance is required. Having these principles as guidance, will result the court to come a decision allowing other matters to rely on the judgment. Thus, it allows this to law and allow the courts then further to develop strict and vicarious liabilities for these crimes.

Reference:

House of Representatives Standing Committee on Communications, Hackers, Fraudsters and Botnets: Tackling the Problem of Cyber Crime — The Report of the Inquiry into Cyber Crime, 2010.

KENNISON v. DAIRE [1986] HCA 4

Criminal Code Act 1995 (Cth)

Week 4 - The Australian Legal System and Jurisdiction

AYB115 Week 4

The profession of forensic accounting involves activities of:

 Investigation of frauds - thorough investigation and calculation of the impact on the business and therefore suggesting the arrest of the culprit for a criminal suit. Today, in the IT environment, where users' profiles are very similar and access controls are somehow lacking, this becomes critical. A general problem in forensic identification arises when a suspect is observed to have a particular rare trait, or combination of traits, also known to be possessed by the criminal (Balding and Donnelly, 1995).

 Legal disputes and/or arbitration

 Preparation and submission of expert reports

 Supporting of Judges in subjects relating to accounting

 Verification of accounting records

 Supporting in due diligence.

In essence, I'd like to draw my experience of studying law that as an evolutionary field, what I have learnt is the profession requires infinite of changing. For example back in the 18th and 19th century there was no legislation in regards to binding electronic contracts. However, now in the 21st century we have electrical signatures that allows contracts to be binding, and for such act to be legalised, this required constant development in the field of law. 

As this is also required in a profession of forensic accounting. We live in a society where technology innovation is constantly occurring. As such a crucial profession that mainly investigates fraud, it is essential that the profession acts similarly to the Law and continues to develop and control fraudulent acts from individuals and large corporations. The constant development will help the profession to 'keep up' with our innovative society.

Reference:

Balding, D. J. and Donnelly, P. (1995), Inference in Forensic Identification. Journal of Royal Statistical Society, 158 Part1, pp. 21-53

Week 3 - Governance and Management Responsibility

Week 3 AYB115 

The COBIT 5 is a toolset that allows managers to bridge the gap between IT requirements, technical issues and business risks. In essence, COBIT is designed to ensure good control over information to meet requirements of its audiences (i.e. Stakeholders). If the business had minimised virus, adware and maleware protection in 2016, crucial information including trading secrets could be obtained which may allow fraud, bribery or corruption to occur.  (Ahmed, 2009).

From my previous experience, if my computer did not install its yearly antivirus software, this leads the information of my computer out to the open. With the current technology innovation, crucial information can be easily stolen without proper maleware protection. 

Principle 1 of COBIT requires the Enterprise to meet stakeholders needs (commercial or not). As such, if the information was stolen this could amount to a risk of bribery to the stakeholders. Such risk also applies to Priniciple 3 of applying a single integrated framework, if information of the enterprises framework, this could lead to a risk of bribery or corruption.

Importantly, according to principle 2 of COBIT provides that there should be covering of the enterprises end-to-end perspective. This includes everything and everyone, internal and external. 

Principle 4 of enabling a holistic approach supports the development of an integrated framework. Enablers are factors that collectively influence whether something will work. The information leaked could lead to bribery.

The leak of principle 5 could lead to risks of fraud, bribery and corruption.

Conclusively, I disagree with the above statement and that  information security should not be minimised regardless of exaggeration to ensure enterprise information is protected.

Reference List:

Ahmad, A. (2009). Exploring COBIT Processes for ITG in Saudi Organisations: An EmpiricalStudy. The International Journal of Digital Accounting Research, 9(1577-8517), 99-126. Retrieved fromhttp://search.proquest.com.ezp01.library.qut.edu.au/docview/197412484/fulltextPDF?accountid=13380. 

Week 2 - Fraud, corruption and IT Governance and Policy

Week 2 - AYB115

In separation of management and governance allows both disciplines to govern their types of activities, different organisational structures and serve different purposes. I believe it is essential that governance ensures that stakeholder needs, conditions and options are evaluated to determine enterprises objectives, setting direction and decision making, and monitoring performance. In contrast, management plans, builds, runs and monitors activities in alignment with the direction set by the governance body to achieve the enterprise objectives. (Ahmad, 2009)

For example when I was employed at MacDonalds, if there was no management, or any sort of governance to monitor performance of employees, this would lead poor quality service and food. If such an arrangements were risks of fraud, bribery or corruption could occur internally.

With such a structure, this establishes the enterprises control reduces the risk of fraud and misconduct. Further, with management this also enables fraud detection. In prevention of bribery, the governance ensures the stakeholders needs and the enterprises objectives, as such, this ensures stakeholders participation. Further, monitoring and managing the potential conflict of interest of members of the enterprise (corruption). 

Hence, I agree with the above statement.

Reference List:

Ahmad, A. (2009). Exploring COBIT Processes for ITG in Saudi Organisations: An EmpiricalStudy. The International Journal of Digital Accounting Research, 9(1577-8517), 99-126. Retrieved from:http://search.proquest.com.ezp01.library.qut.edu.au/docview/197412484/fulltextPDF?accountid=13380.