Under Auditing Standard 5, passed in mid-2007, the auditof internal control over financial reporting is now integrated with the auditof the financialstatements.
The independent external auditor is a licensed professional who works for a public accounting firm and performs an auditof the financialstatementsof a company, government, individual, or any other legal entity or organization.
During the last four years, Deloitte has issued non-qualified audit opinions on the financialstatements, in spite of ongoing material weaknesses in internal controls over their financial reporting.
Those companies would have otherwise experienced the ignominy of admitting that a non-independent audit firm had attested to prior-filed financialstatements.
The same morning at the Harvard School of Business, 40 audit committee members will attend "Audit Committees in a New Era of Governance" and commiserate about having to put a stamp of approval on financialstatements prepared by others.