ROCHESTER, N.Y. — A 26-year-old man is headed to prison for his role in a financial fraud scheme involving stolen checks.
Sheldon Marquis Adams was sentenced to 18 months in prison. Adams worked with others to get hundreds of checks stolen from postal service mailboxes in Rochester.
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According to prosecutors, Adams and the others would use social media to get people to cash or deposit the checks into their own accounts and withdraw the money before the issuing bank detected fraud.
If the checks were cashed they were given to Adams and the others, and in return, the people who cashed them got a small payment.
Prosecutors say there were stolen and altered checks totaling over $516,000.
Adams used to play basketball at Bishop Kearney, later playing for Buffalo State.
IT & DATA SECURITY (MITIGATING THE “INSIDER THREAT”)
As seen in the TD Bank case, an employee with too much “access” can sell your customer data to syndicates.
- Principle of Least Privilege (PoLP): Employees should only have access to the specific folders and databases required for their current task.
- Access Revocation: Have a “Termination Checklist” that ensures all digital access (Email, VPN, Banking) is revoked within 60 minutes of an employee resigning or being dismissed.
- System Logs & Audit Trails: Enable “Read/Write Logging” on your server. If a customer’s data is leaked, you need to know exactly which login accessed that record and at what time.
- Encryption at Rest: Ensure that sensitive files (like your customer ID numbers or payroll spreadsheets) are encrypted so that if a staff member copies them to a USB, they cannot be read.