This study investigates whether audit risks that accompany data breaches of major customer firms can spillover into the supply chain and affect audit fees of their suppliers. Based on the economic bond that exists between supplier firms and their major customers, we predict that data breach incidents of customer firms will lead to higher audit fees for their respective suppliers. Consistent with customer breaches increasing the audit risk to the supplier, we observe a positive association between breach disclosures made by major customers and audit fees of the supplier firm. This association exists for both internal and external data breaches. We further find that audit fees are increasing with the number of major customers disclosing a breach in a given year. Our results are robust to both a matched sample design and a difference-in-difference approach. Interestingly, we find that while supplier auditors appear to price the risks associated with customer breaches, the breaches do not appear to affect audit quality. The findings of this study are timely and relevant to academics, practitioners, and regulators as supply chains continue to become larger and more complex.

本研究调查了伴随主要客户公司数据泄露的审计风险是否会溢出到供应链中并影响其供应商的审计费用。基于供应商公司与其主要客户之间存在的经济纽带，我们预测客户公司的数据泄露事件将导致其各自供应商的审计费用更高。与增加供应商审计风险的客户违规行为一致，我们观察到主要客户披露的违规行为与供应商公司的审计费用之间存在正相关关系。这种关联存在于内部和外部数据泄露中。我们进一步发现，审计费用随着在特定年份披露违规行为的主要客户数量的增加而增加。我们的结果对于匹配的样本设计和差分法都是稳健的。有趣的是，我们发现虽然供应商审计师似乎对与客户违规相关的风险进行定价，但违规似乎并不影响审计质量。随着供应链不断变得越来越大和越来越复杂，这项研究的结果非常及时，并且与学术界、从业者和监管机构相关。