Time to Establish Rules for Independent Assurance on XBRL Data

A recent survey by the CFA Institute reveals that 77% of investors want some form of independent assurance on XBRL Reports.  At present there is no requirement by the regulators for assurance on XBRL Reports.  The survey is even more important with the pending adoption of inline XBRL, which is going to be required by the SEC and ESMA in the not-too -distant future.

Inline XBRL is notable because of the fact that all XBRL data is included in the same document as the human readable version of the filings. At present the human readable version has assurance reports on it. So users will tend to assume that if there is an audit opinion on the readable part of the filing, then the opinion will apply to all the filing, including the XBRL part. At present, that wouldn't be the case, as auditors do not audit the XBRL.  Much confusion will be the result.

So, it is time to establish guidelines for the audit of XBRL data. XBRL International issued a report on this topic a few years ago, and dealt with the issues in some depth. That is a good starting point. And here's another article on this topic.