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A continuous audit can identify suspicious transactions when they occur rather than weeks or months later.
A well-performed continuous audit would certainly have brought to light the company's operational problems much earlier.
The need to improve and accelerate audit activities has led in part to the increased adoption of continuous auditing as a vital monitoring tool.
Continuous auditing is not to be confused with computer-aided auditing. In computer-aided auditing, the auditor is simply being assisted by technology, such as spreadsheets to complete a periodic audit. Computer-aided auditing is driven solely by the auditor, while continuous auditing is meant to run automatically at regular intervals.