Who Will Audit the Auditors?

Some accounting firms, it has been suggested, are advocating this software not so their clients can better comply with Sarbanes-Oxley, but only so the firms themselves can use the software to assist in their attestation. In that case, says Taub, "there should not be anything — so long as it is limited to that — that would be a problem."

Eisner LLP's Rosen nonetheless suggests that companies sidestep the independence issue altogether. "Given what the SEC says in its release, if I was an audit committee member, there isn't a prayer that I'd use my own audit firm to do it," says Rosen. "How many times do you need to be hit in the head to realize it hurts? At some point you just get knocked out."

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