Hey, news lover. Here’s what I was able to scrape up from our corner of the internet to get you nice and informed on this fine Monday morning.
In this news brief
PwC Goes AI-First
PwC announced it’s pushing out a new delivery model that’s heavy on the AI.
Today, PwC introduced PwC One, a significant milestone in the firm’s AI-first transformation and its vision for the future of professional services.
PwC One reflects how PwC is reimagining the way expertise, technology and professional judgment come together to serve clients. By combining the firm’s deep institutional knowledge with emerging autonomous AI capabilities, PwC One enables PwC clients and teams to engage with complex challenges in new ways — moving beyond episodic projects toward more continuous insight, faster learning cycles and earlier visibility into risk and opportunity.
The launch represents the next milestone in PwC’s multi-year effort to embed AI across how the firm develops its people, builds technology and delivers work. PwC is integrating AI directly into its methodologies and professional workflows — extending the reach of its expertise while keeping human judgment firmly at the center of every critical decision.
Let’s remember what Paul Griggs recently said about partners who resist AI…no one is safe: PwC partners who fail to embrace AI have no future at firm, US CEO warns
A Tax Associate Who Has No Idea What They’re Getting Into
While we’re on the topic of PwC, here’s someone who’s in for a brutal reality check:
Username checks out:
How do you get this far in the early stages of your career and not get earfuls from other people further along than you about how hard they work you? I’m gonna need you all to step up your game, you’re not being negative enough. We’ll do our part too, don’t worry.
Shouldn’t all this AI they’re forcing into everything make this go away already? Oh God what am I saying…the naivety is contagious!
Cheat and Cheat Again
A young EYer got in trouble for using a cell phone to look up study materials while taking exams and lying about it when confronted by officials, reports Financial Review. His career isn’t completely ruined yet though.
An EY staff member has been fined almost $6000 and his professional credentials have been suspended until 2027 for repeatedly using a mobile phone during exams and then lying about it.
The case was flagged in evidence to an annual grilling of the major accounting professional bodies, which heard that members of professional body Chartered Accountants ANZ had confessed to almost 200 instances of past cheating.
He tried to claim he was using pen and paper to do some calculations (which of course look nothing like a cell phone) until presented with evidence that clearly showed it was a phone.
But OK, live and learn right?
However, he was caught using a phone again during a subsequent exam for the same subject in June.
The staffer again admitted he had been accessing study material and again apologised and took “full responsibility” for his actions.
Guy, taking responsibility also means not doing it again. You know that, yeah?
He told officials he wanted to “demonstrate to CA ANZ that he will learn from his mistake and is embarrassed by his behaviour, which was a reflection of his stress and lack of composure”, and said “he values the CA ANZ qualification”.
Oh. Yet somehow he’s still not completely screwed, just on ice with CA ANZ until next year.
KPMG Won’t Be Responsible For Skynet
KPMG talked to Business Insider about how they intend to not unleash Skynet. Here’s what they said:
Organizations are preparing to scale agentic systems enterprise-wide, but clients remain wary of agents, Sam Gloede, Trusted AI leader at KPMG, told Business Insider.
“One of the biggest concerns is probably how do you make sure that you allow them to have the autonomy to do the valuable things we need them to do, but to stop them from going wild or taking over.”
KPMG has created a multifaceted framework to protect against worst-case scenarios for both clients and its own employees, said Gloede.
“A robust set of controls is really important,” she said. Businesses need to clearly define what their agents are allowed to do and ensure monitoring systems can detect when they stray beyond those boundaries. Agents should only interact with the systems and data they strictly need, limiting the potential impact of errors, said Gloede.
These headers sure are something.
Am I not worried enough about this? This sounds like something I should be vaguely worried about happening.
Who Wants to Read About Gas Taxes
The Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy wrote about gas prices and went deep on how gas taxes work if that’s something you’re interested in reading about.
Tis the Season to Talk About Tax Scams
Marketplace ran an episode about tax scams and in it, we learn that young people are getting hit the hardest:
Tax season is here, and with it come scammers hoping to steal your money or even personal information. Now, with AI in the picture, the scams are getting more sophisticated. Some come in the form of emails and text messages posing as the IRS; others mimic legitimate websites and calls.
Don’t feel too awful if you fall for it — a new survey from McAfee found that nearly one in four Americans have been victims of a tax scam, with 18- to 24-year-olds being the hardest hit at 42%.
So much for boomers being the most technologically illiterate. That aligns with that Deloitte survey from a couple years ago: Deloitte Survey Finds Zoomers Are 3x More Likely to Fall For Scams Than Boomers So Why Don’t More of Them Work at Deloitte (the joke is…well, just scroll up and re-read the one about the incoming tax associate asking “do we get paid overtime?”)
Refresh yourself on this year’s IRS Dirty Dozen for more scam education:
And that’s it for this news brief. Email or text if you have a tip, story, or complaint/compliment and have a great week!
