To help prevent one job role from having sufficient access to create, modify, and approve payroll data, which of the following practices should be employed?

Least privilege ensures users are granted only the minimum access required to perform their duties, but it doesn't inherently divide a sensitive process among multiple roles to prevent one role from having excessive cumulative control.

Job rotation involves moving employees between different roles to detect fraud and provide cross-training, but it does not directly prevent a single job role from having complete control over a process at any given time.

Background checks verify an individual's history and trustworthiness before employment, which is a pre-emptive measure but not a control for distributing operational access or preventing a single role from accumulating excessive privileges.

Separation of duties is a fundamental security control that divides critical functions, such as creating, modifying, and approving payroll, among multiple individuals or job roles. This ensures no single person has sufficient access to execute or conceal fraudulent activities or errors, thereby directly preventing the scenario where one job role can control the entire payroll process.