Message from Chairman, IT Committee for ISA members – December 2004
Dear Members,
Welcome to the next issue of IT Harmony. I take
this platform to convey some important updates for the
benefit of the members.
IT Conferences: At the onset, I would like to inform
you about the following FOUR Conferences being organized
by the IT Committee for your benefit:
| 1. Emerging IT/ Fiscal Law Challenges & Opportunities
|
Dec 11-12, 2004 |
Lucknow |
| 2. Emerging Professional Opportunities |
Dec 18, 2004 |
Ghaziabad, UP |
| 3. Changing IT Scenario & Emerging Opportunities
for CAs’s |
Jan 8-9, 2005 |
Mumbai |
| 4. Emerging Professional Opportunities in IT &
Fiscal Laws |
Jan 22-23, 2005 |
Amity Business School, Sector 44, Noida, UP |
Further details of the above conferences have been hosted
in the websites of the Institute at www.icai.org
and ISA Portal at www.isaicai.org.
You are requested to participate and derive maximum benefit
from this opportunity.
Computer as an Audit Tool: Another initiative
of the IT Committee is to make you start using the computer
as an audit tool. A “CAAT Resources CD” was
sent to all ISA Members. It contained working copies of
two audit tools and a walk through of third, as also certain
white papers/ presentations/ success stories/ case studies
etc., We do hope that you are well on your way, in this
regard. Branches and Regional Councils are requested to
provide convenient dates for holding CAAT Workshops for
the benefit of members in their region/ branch.
Also as the need was felt for the practical training,
I am happy to announce that IT committee of ICAI is inaugurating
a Proof of concept laboratory in Chennai on 17th of this
month to provide the hands-on training to ISA participants
& qualified professionals.. Soon such kind of labs
will be opened in other metro cities also.
The theme for this issue of IT Harmony is on “IT/
IS Audit Standards”. It deals with need
for IS Audit Standards, ISO/ IEC/ BS 17799 Standard, Internal
Audit Standards, IEEE – An International Standard
for IT, COBIT, COSO, Case Study on ISO 17799 & Tips
to Tech Accountant on Identity, Access Management &
Web Standards.
The business world is no more national. They are all converging
into a global set up. The easy access to the global pitch
is adherence to “standards” be it technology
standards, product standards, quality standards, IT standards,
security standards and so on. Standards in a
simpler meaning refers to Professional Practices Framework
that are intended to have global application.
Every organization has a mission. In this digital era,
the business firms use automated information technology
(IT) systems to process their information for better support
of their missions and objectives. Protecting information
systems and demonstrating compliance with accepted standards
of good practice is an increasingly important part of
effective corporate governance. By creating and enforcing
corporate information security policies, standards, and
procedures, organizations can reduce risk while ensuring
the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of their
critical data, applications, and systems. The organizations
should necessarily set up IT standards and procedures
as part of their IT security strategy. ISO 17799 brings
out the details of physical and logical issues that the
organizations should take into account before defining
their own corporate security standards.
The current IT Harmony focuses on the importance of standards
in a business firm. The articles throw light on the control
environment, which is the base for effective internal
control and apex of the corporate governance structure.
This is necessarily followed by control activities –
the policies procedures and practices, which are placed
in sequential order to ascertain that the business objectives
are attained and risk mitigation strategies are adhered
to. Articles on two most important technical standards
viz. ISO standards and IEEE standards has been carried
out in this issue, which I am sure, would definitely add
value to the academic knowledge of the readers, especially
the IEEE 802 which is the basic standards designed by
IEEE for Information technology.
As usual, a special note on the need of standards to be
followed by internal auditors has been covered as internal
audit always forms a broad foundation for good corporate
governance. There have been continuous changes in the
standards. The auditors are required to keep abreast of
the changes with a view to obtain higher efficiency levels.
Information System Auditors are expected to conduct audit
across heterogeneous environments and hence an updated
awareness of standards are of paramount importance to
them. Knowledge on COBIT & COSO which are the Audit
standards are equally important towards meeting global
standards in IS audit. Tips to Tech Accountants dwells
in detail on the various security standards such as XML,
XML Encryption, XML Signatures, SOAP that would mitigate
security threats.
Since this whole concept is more of technical in nature
and owing to enormity of standards, we could only give
an over view of the concept of standards. I would be happy
if you could develop your knowledge and contribute more
on this subject on a continuous basis.
Have a great reading.
With warm regards
Harinderjit Singh
Chairman, IT Committee
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