Sarbanes-Oxley Sparks Forensics Apps Interest.

AVERY Dennison Corp. 008256364 AVY; UNIVERSAL Health Services Inc. UHS; OVERSIGHT Technologies Inc.

This article reports on the decision of U.S. companies to use computer forensics tools to help identify potential cases of financial fraud in an effort to comply with the requirements of the Sarbanes-Oxley financial reporting law in March 2004. Avery Dennison Corp. is piloting software by Oversight Technologies Inc. that can be used to monitor finance systems for irregular transactions. The software should reduce the amount of time workers spend poring over financial data to determine whether any information has been altered or corrupted. Other users are expected to come to the same conclusion about computer forensics tools, which can track how data is used and modified. Universal Health Services Inc., operator of hospitals and other medical facilities already has several fraud-detection systems in place that should be able to help it meet the mandates set by Sarbanes-Oxley. Pricing for Oversight's monitoring tools starts at $85,000 and, depending on the number of end users, can go up to about $200,000. Other vendors of forensics tools include Guidance Software Inc., Consul Risk Management Inc., and Addamark Technologies Inc., which plans to announce upgrade software for storing system log data.