根据这篇文章，世界上有两套主要的审计标准。一套是International Audit and Assurance Standards Board (IAASB)的标准，有许多国家采用， 统称 IAASB’s Engagement Standards,包括：

• International Standards on Audit Engagements (IASs)

• International Standards on Review Engagements (ISREs)

• International Standards on Other Assurance Engagements (ISAEs)

• International Standards on Related Services (ISRSs)

另一套国际知名标准是美国注册会计师协会（American Institute of Certified Public Accountants)各委员会如 Auditing Standards Board (ASB)、 Accounting and Review Services Committee (ARSC)制定的标准。ASB 发布 的Audit和Attest标准，统称ASB Statements,内容包括：

• Statements on Auditing Standards (SASs)

• Statements on Standards for Attestation Engagements (SSAEs)

• Statements on Quality Control Standards (SQCSs)

ARSC发布的标准是：

• Statements on Standards for Accounting and Review Services (SSARs) AICPA当然还发布了其他的标准。

根据IAASB的国际标准，审计师不提供所谓的attestation或attestation engagement/ services ：

Attestation is considered to be certifying the absolute correctness or incorrectness of the subject matter. Under the pronouncements issued by IAASB, practitioner is not expected to provide any certification or to vouch for correctness or incorrectness of the subject matter. Rather he provides his opinion, which provides some degree of assurance which can be maximum of reasonable nature which is high level of assurance but still not certifying or vouching. 

而根据ASB发布的美国标准，

... the word attestation has some different meanings from what we usually understand. Usually attestation is considered to be providing the guarantee about a particular subject matter. However, this is not the case under standards issued by ASB. Attestation engagements are more of such engagements which are described as Other Assurance Engagements under the pronouncements issued by IAASB.

由此我们可以推论：采用美国标准的使用attestation—词，采用国际标 准的其他国家使用assurance—词，两者的意思并无太大区别。

另外，文章还提到：美国也用assurance engagements的概念，它包括 audit engagement 和 attestation engagements0 就好比 IAASB 的 assurance engagements 包括 audit engagements，review engagements and other assurance engagements。在总结attestation和audit的区别时，文章指出：

In short，attestation engagement is one type of assurance engagement under the pronouncements issued by ASB which provides lesser degree of assurance than the audit engagement conducted according to GAAS (SASs).

综上所述，assurance和attestation实质内容相同，用哪个词关系不大。 既然中国采用国际标准，不妨使用国际标准中习惯的assurance。译为 attestation的唯一的缺点是，在翻译“第3101号鉴证业务准则”时，不得不转而使用assurance。不过，这对于熟悉会计业务的专业读者而言，应该 不构成什么理解障碍。再有，并非所有“鉴证”都译为assurance或 attestation。作为一个动作时，可以译为 evaluate, assess, review, audit 等词。

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