Network Security News

Reserve bank IT worker charged in ID theft scam

Monday, April 27, 2009

An IT worker dismissed in February from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and his brother were arrested Friday and charged in federal court with bank fraud and identity theft.

The U.S. attorney for Southern New York is alleging that Curtis Wiltshire, 34, used access to the personal information of New York Fed employees to take out fraudulent student loans using stolen information.

The brother, Kenneth Wiltshire, 40, is charged with using the identities of two federal employees to try and obtain a boat loan.

The charges came after reserve bank investigators discovered two 2006 student loan applications on a thumb drive attached to the work computer of Curtis Wiltshire.

Later, a U.S. Postal Service inspector followed Kenneth Wiltshire to a P.O. box that was opened using a phony driver's license to receive documents for a fraudulent boat loan, according to the U.S. attorney.

According to the attorney, Curtis Wiltshire through his work had access to names, dates of birth, Social Security numbers and photographs of Federal reserve bank employees, which he allegedly used to create the fraudulent IDs to obtain the loans.