Incorporating big data in audits: Identifying inhibitors and a research agenda to address those inhibitors

Abstract

With corporate investment in Big Data of $34 billion in 2013 growing to $232 billion through 2016 (Gartner 2012), the Big 4 accounting firms are aiming to be at the forefront of Big Data implementations. Notably, they see Big Data as an increasingly essential part of their assurance practice. We argue that while there is a place for Big Data in auditing, its application to auditing is less clear than it is in the other fields, such as marketing and medical research. The objectives of this paper are to: (1) provide a discussion of both the inhibitors of incorporating Big Data into financial statement audits; and (3) present a research agenda to identify approaches to ameliorate those inhibitors.