[ConservativeMind]

SOX is a pretty solid set of controls to assure the financial statement is valid.

It includes both financial and information technology controls.

External auditors can rely on controls audited by internal audit, but it would have been proven to have been accurate, at some point in time.

I will say I am not aware of a SOX control that would care about the number of customers. Instead, it is strictly financial, so income and expenditures would be things the accounting department would have to get right—not the number of “valid customers.”

[FLT-bird]

Ad revenue depends on the number of customers. If they knowingly overstated the number of customers via deliberately undercounting the percentage of bots, that is fraud. The corporate officers are in serious trouble if that is the case.

I’ve worked in audit for over 20 years.

[FtrPilot]

Instead, it is strictly financial, so income and expenditures would be things the accounting department would have to get right—not the number of “valid customers.”

If revenue is impacted by number of "valid customers" (more customers means more advertising revenue) then SOX certainly applies.

[Ms. AntiFeminazi]

SOX cares very much about valid customers. Fake accounts is a big SOX violation for a number of reasons including fraud and rev rec.

[plain talk]

“I will say I am not aware of a SOX control that would care about the number of customers. Instead, it is strictly financial, so income and expenditures would be things the accounting department would have to get right—not the number of “valid customers.””

My thoughts exactly.