SOFTWARE TOOLS GROUP 4

Vendor-supported systems- are custom (or customized) systems that client organizations purchase commercially rather than develop in-house. CAAT or CAATTS Computer Assisted Audit Tools and Techniques refers to the use of certain software that can be used by the auditor to perform audits and to achieve the goals of auditing. Data Analysis Software Data analysis software is the most popular category of CAATTS and is loosely referred to as audit software. This software has the ability to extract data from commonly used file formats and the tables of most database systems. Thus, these systems can be used during the audits of almost any application on any technology platform. The audit software can perform a variety of queries and other analyses on the data. Benefits of Using Audit Software With data volumes growing and management expectations on assurances becoming more specific, random verifications and testing do not yield the desired value. The use of audit software ensures 100 percent scrutiny of transactions in which there is audit interest, and pointed identification and zeroing in on erroneous/exceptional transactions, even when data volumes are huge. And all this can be done in a fraction of the time required with manual methods.

Software is a set of programs, procedures, algorithms and its documentation concerned with the operation of a data processing system. Types of software 1. System software is computer software designed to operate the computer hardware, to provide basic functionality, and to provide a platform for running application software 2. Programming software include tools in the form of programs or applications that software developers use to create, debug, maintain, or otherwise support other programs and applications. 3. Application software - is a program or group of programs designed for end users Commercial packages for software are available to meet management needs. Three basic types of commercial software: Turnkey systems are completely finished and tested systems that are ready to for implementation. They are general-purpose systems or systems customizes to a specific industry. Backbone systems- consist of basic system structure on which to build. The primary processing logic is preprogrammed and the vendor then designs the user interfaces to suit the clients unique needs.

Another advantage of the audit software is the uniform user friendly interface that the audit software presents to the auditor for performing all the tasks, irrespective of the data formats or the underlying technology used by the application. The audit software also maintains logs of the tests done for review by peers and seniors, and advanced features allow the programming of certain macros and routines that can further enhance audit speeds and efficiency.

Generalized Audit Software (GAS) GAS is the most widely used CAATT (Computer Assisted Audit Tools and Techniques) for IS Auditing. GAS allows auditors to access electronically coded data files and perform various operations on their contents. ACL (Audit Command Language) and IDEA (Interactive Data Extraction and Analysis) are the leading products. The following audit tasks can be performed using GAS: 1. Footing and balancing entire files or selected data items 2. Selecting and reporting detailed data contained on files 3. Selecting stratified statistical samples from data files 4. Formatting results of tests into reports 5. Printing confirmations in either standardized or special wording 6. Screening data and selectively including or excluding items 7. Comparing two files and identifying any differences

8. Recalculating data fields GAS is popular because of four factors: 1. GAS languages are easy to use and require little IT background on the part of the auditor 2. GAS may be used on any type of computer because it is hardware independent 3. Auditors can perform their tests on data independent of Client IT professional 4. GAS can be used to audit the data files of many different applications Benefits include: They are independent of the system being audited and will use a read-only copy of the file to avoid any corruption of an organizations data. Many audit-specific routines are used such as sampling. Provides documentation of each test performed in the software that can be used as documentation in the auditors work papers. Fraud detection CAATTs such as GAS provides auditors with tools that can identify unexpected or unexplained patterns in data that may indicate fraud. Whether the CAATs is simple or complex, data analysis provides many benefits in the prevention and detection of fraud. It can assist the auditor in detecting fraud by performing and creating the following: 1. Analytical tests- evaluations of financial information made by studying plausible

relationships among both financial and non-financial data to assess whether account balances appear reasonable .Examples include ratio, and trends. 2. Data analysis reports- reports produced using specific audit commands such as filtering records and joining data files. 3. Continuous monitoring- Continuous monitoring is an ongoing process for acquiring, analyzing, and reporting on business data to identify and respond to operational business risks. For auditors to ensure a comprehensive approach to acquire, analyze, and report on business data, they must make certain the organization continuously monitors user activity on all computer systems, business transactions and processes, and application controls.

1. Program development contains application development software. 2. Backup and recovery the DBMS periodically makes backup copies. In the event of a disaster (ex. Disk failure, program error or malicious act), the DBMS can recover data. 3. Database usage reporting captures statistics on what data are being used, when they are used, and who uses them 4. Database access the most important feature of a DBMS is to permit authorized user access to the database.

Database Management includes three fundamental tasks: 1. Storage assigns keys to new records and stored them in their proper location in the database 2. Retrieval- the task of locating and extracting an existing record from the database for processing 3. Deletion- permanently removes obsolete or redundant records from the database Database Management fraud includes altering, corrupting, destroying or stealing an organizations data. DBMS provides strict and controlled user access to eliminate fraud.

Database software-any software that is designed for creating databases and managing the information stored in them. Sometimes referred to as database management systems (DBMS), database software tools are primarily used for storing, modifying, extracting, and searching for information within a database. Database Management System (DBMS) -is a special software system that is programmed to know which data elements each user is authorized to access. The purpose of DBMS is to provide controlled access to the database. Features of DBMS include: