please critique the following discussion and support your response in 3 scholars cited .

It was an accounting scandal that led to a number of earnings restatements and fraud-related charges against three of the company's top executives (Reuters Staff, 2008). Nortel Networks Corp, a telecom giant, did not survive, filing for creditor protection in 2009 and then liquidated (McFarland, 2013).

According to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the company overstated revenue in 2000 to make the company look like it was doing better than its competitors during difficult market conditions (Coenen, n.d.). It also misused liabilities to make the company look more profitable than it was (Reuters Staff, 2008). In addition to a lawsuit filed against the company by the SEC, three former executives including the CEO Frank Dunn, the CFO Douglas Beatty, and the Controller Michael Gollogly faced fraud charges.

Preventative measures that could (and should) have been taken by the company include (Harrison, Horngren, Thomas, Berberich & Seguin, 2015):

1. Establish acontrol environment, including a corporate code of conduct that communicates the company policies on integrity and ethical values. The CEO and management should have lead by example as to acceptable behaviour.
2. Ensureinformation systemsare accurate. The company should have kept better track of assets, liabilities, profits and losses so that discrepancies could have been captured by its auditors.
3. Implementcontrol procedures, including proper separation of duties, comparison checks, adequate records, and proper approvals.
4. Make sure no individual or group of persons can process a transaction without being checked by another person or group withmonitoring of controls. Modern computer systems and more thorough external audits would probably have caught the discrepancies sooner.

References:

Coenen, Tracy. (n.d.). SEC Suit Against Nortel Highlights Accounting Fraud Schemes.AllBusiness.com. Retrieved from https://www.allbusiness.com/sec-suit-against-nortel-highlights-accounting-fraud-schemes-4967888-1.html

Harrison, W.T., Horngren, C.T., Thomas, C.W., Berberich, G. & Seguin, C. (2015).Financial Accounting(5thCanadian ed.). Don Mills, ON: Pearson Canada Inc.

McFarland, Janet. (2013, January 14). Three former Nortel executives found not guilty of fraud.The Globe and Mail.Retrieved from https://beta.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/industry-news/the-law-page/three-former-nortel-executives-found-not-guilty-of-fraud/article7319241/?ref=http://www.theglobeandmail.com&

Reuters Staff. (2008, June 19). CHRONOLOGY: Key dates in Nortel's accounting scandal.Reuters: #MARKET NEWS.Retrieved from https://www.reuters.com/article/us-nortel-charges-chro/chronology-key-dates-in-nortels-accounting-scandal-idUSN1936265020080619