Forensics Journal - Stevenson University 2015 | Page 19

FORENSICS JOURNAL

What if a small business using QuickBooks Online could purchase an
app that would allow them to run an anti-fraud report based on their
company data at the push of a button?

SUGGESTIONS AND CONCLUSION
Fraud prevention and detection are issues that both small and
large businesses must address. When faced with a potential loss
related to fraud of almost 5% of revenues, a company should
implement internal controls to prevent those estimates from
becoming a reality. Anti-fraud internal controls such as an audit,
an internal audit department, a code of conduct, a fraud hotline,
and proactive data analysis have been determined by the ACFE to
reduce fraud. Specifically, proactive data analysis was found to be
the most effective in preventing fraud for small businesses.

Clearly there are resources for small businesses to implement proactive
data analysis tools. With the significant advances in technology, new
solutions may be on the horizon. 
REFERENCES
ACL Analytics. (n.d.a). ACL Add-In 1.0. Retrieved from
http://www.acl.com

The most significant barriers to implementing proactive data analysis
at a small business are the reduced financial and human resources
available. However, there are cost effective ways to do it. To start,
small businesses can perform both a horizontal and vertical analysis
on their monthly financial statements and investigate irregularities.
They can also calculate profitability and liquidity ratios. Finally, they
can calculate a Benish M Score and utilize Benford’s Law.

ACL Analytics. (n.d.b). ACL analytics. Retrieved December 2, 2014,
from http://www.acl.com
Association of Certified Fraud Examiners. (2014a). Report to the
nations on occupational fraud and abuse. Austin, TX: Author.
Association of Certified Fraud Examiners. (2014b). Sample fraud
policy. Austin, TX: Author.

The next step would be to consider using more advanced data analysis
programs. Microsoft Excel has many features to perform data analysis,
and it is probably already installed on many computers. Adding the
ACL Add-In to Excel can add another layer of advanced analysis that
will help make data analysis more effective and efficient.

Caseware Analtics. (n.d.). IDEA data analysis. Retrieved
December 2, 2014, from http://www.casewareanalytics.com/
products/idea-data-analysis
Forensic toolkit (FTK). (n.d.). Retrieved December 2, 2014, from
http://accessdata.com/.../digital-forensics/forensic-toolkit-ftk

When a small business reaches a level of profitability where they
can incorp