Cheung Chun-yin: Making flexible use of blockchains to make audits more efficient

Cheung Chun-yin, Risk Assurance Partner of PwC China, believes that the definition of innovation is going from nothing to something, while the goals are to solve society’s problems and create value. In the digital age, innovation is generally delivered by means of science and technology, and the key elements of innovation are what Cheung collectively calls “ABCD”: A is for artificial intelligence, B stands for blockchains, C refers to cloud computing, and D means big data. These four elements are all key technologies that drive today’s economy.

Blockchains are the emerging technology that is most closely linked with the accounting industry. Cheung explained that audits of large companies traditionally often require the services of over a thousand people and involve a vast amount of documents. He noted that if documents are stored in blockchains, the technology’s inherent ability to share data in collaborative formats that are also encrypted makes tampering extremely difficult. He explained that traditional methods require large numbers of people to request confirmation letters from other organizations to confirm the veracity of documentation. Looking at the experience of the industry in Taiwan, the local government stores all correspondence in blockchains, so that all auditors and companies can review information through unified blockchains, saving a great deal of time and eliminating fiddly processes.

While some people are of the opinion that the emergence of AI, blockchains and other innovative technologies may speed up the obsolescence of existing jobs, Cheung said that while the emergence of AI may well cause existing job types to disappear, it will also produce new types of job, so it will not cause a loss of job opportunities for young people. The example he gave was that specialist organizations will take on the role of verifying the results of the AI work, thereby creating new work opportunities.