Re: Overcoming objections to Oracle

DA Morgan wrote:

> Noons wrote:
>

>> DA Morgan wrote:
>>
[...]
> In the US we have a law, several years old, named Sarbanes-Oxley
> after the two Senators that authored it. It is some times shortened
> to SarbOx and other times to SOx.
>
> On one hand it is about process. On another it clearly defines who
> in an organization is responsible for the authenticity of financial
> numbers which includes accounting, inventory, assets, etc.
>
> Ultimately it makes auditors careful about what they sign off on and
> it requires CEOs and CFOs to personally guarantee the numbers are
> accurate under pain of fines and/or jail time.
>
> All US banks are subject to the act as well as all publicly held
> companies and many large privately held concerns.

My understanding is that private companies in the U.S. are not subject to SarbOx, nor are public companies with a market capitalization under $75 million (USD). Perhaps some are subject to it, indirectly, if their customers are subject to SarbOx and they (the customers) demand it of their service providers "by extension". By contrast, there are companies that probably should have been subject to HIPPA "by extension" but haven't been (HIPPA is similar to SarbOx in that it mandates certain privacy controls on personal health insurance information).

Has any individual actually been convicted, or even charged (civilly or criminally), of a crime under SarbOx rules? After all, it's been a year since Section 404(a) kicked in, surely someone would have tried to test the limits by now.... or have the all the CEO's of America turned into saints? ;-)

Don't get me wrong, I'm a strong proponent of full disclosure (when it applies equally to both parties, of course). SarbOx is a good idea, I'm   just wondering aloud how it has played out in practice, at least as far as the public is allowed to know ...

-Mark Bole Received on Mon Nov 21 2005 - 21:31:10 CST