A Social Light Can Protect Investors

There were no corner offices in the famous “Lipstick” building where Bernie Madoff had his offices in Midtown Manhattan.
Still he managed to lurk behind a veil of secrecy. As forbes.com reported back in 2009, “He directed Cohmad [the securities firm partly owned by Madoff] employees to operate secretively. He barred them from using e-mail after 2006, the year he finally registered his own advisory business after avoiding it for decades. He told Cohmad employees not to refer any clients with finance backgrounds because they would ‘ask too many questions.’” My question is this: If all of Bernie Madoff’s investors were connected through a social network, how long do you think the fraud could have gone on? More on Forbes here.