Names of payees varied, even within a single company's dataset, and Google Refine was used to aggregate the data for each individual listed when variations in name occurred such as the addition of an initial or an abbreviated first name.
The online database, named Checkbook NYC, allows users to search and download expenditures by agency, the name of a payee, the purpose and the amount.
Crooks use acetone — the active ingredient in nail-polish remover — to take the name of the payee and the amount off of an intercepted check, leaving just your signature on what is effectively now a blank check.
If a check is not properly voided, it is easier for a criminal to erase the name of the payee or the amount of the check, add new information and cash the check.
Officials at Harris, a publisher of gun and hunting magazines, discovered the fraud through a preliminary audit, and found that Ms. Caparas had inserted her name on the payee line of more than 50 checks for amounts of $15,000 to $75,000.
But, according to prosecutors, a preliminary audit found that she had inserted her name on the payee line of more than 50 checks that ranged from $15,000 to $75,000.
Ms. Caparas managed to illegally supplement her salary of $150,000 by inserting her own name as a payee in the books that she kept, pushing her pay to almost $1 million, court records show.
Mr. Kareri, they said, then altered the check to change its value to $140,000, wrote a friend's name on the payee line, and then maneuvered to have the funds redirected to his wife.
When he received the checks from Tishman to pay Mr. John, he added his last name to the payee line and deposited them in his own account, they said.
According to the Payment Strategy Forum (PSF), which is handling the implementation for the banks and building societies, the "confirmation of payee" system should largely eliminate both problems.
Payments UK, which represents all banks and other payments providers, has proposed introducing a "confirmation of payee capability" to the payments system.
