{"id":5848,"date":"2021-03-26T16:08:34","date_gmt":"2021-03-26T16:08:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blackopspartners.com\/?p=5848"},"modified":"2021-08-23T02:48:35","modified_gmt":"2021-08-23T02:48:35","slug":"americas-enemies-are-targeting-businesses-this-fbi-office-focuses-on-corporate-security-and-fraud","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blackopspartners.com\/americas-enemies-are-targeting-businesses-this-fbi-office-focuses-on-corporate-security-and-fraud\/","title":{"rendered":"America\u2019s enemies are targeting businesses. This FBI office focuses on corporate security and fraud."},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Originally published by The Daily Press<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

When the FBI\u2019s Norfolk office cracked an early case of pandemic relief fraud last spring, private sector coordinator Randy Bowling set up sessions for his colleagues to brief many of the several hundred businesses he works with.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His job is a twist on the Federal Bureau of Investigation\u2019s long effort to crack down on fraud, theft and espionage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOur default now is to share as much information as possible; that\u2019s a paradigm shift for us,\u201d Bowling said, adding that the bureau has long had a reputation of keeping what it knows close to its chest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s changed, FBI Director Christopher Wray said, because national security challenges have.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cEconomic espionage dominates the FBI\u2019s counterintelligence program,\u201d Wray has told business leaders, outlining the mission of the FBI\u2019s 3-year-old Office of Private Sector. \u201cMore than ever, the adversaries\u2019 targets are at your end, your ideas, your innovations, your R&D, your technology.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As the Norfolk field office\u2019s private sector coordinator, Bowling\u2019s job is to offer a kind of one-stop shop for businesses to reach out to the FBI.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That means listening carefully to business concerns \u2014 \u201cWhat keeps them up at night,\u201d as Bowling put it \u2014 as well as sharing information, like the basics of that pandemic relief fraud case, in which a Norfolk man obtained $196,000 in Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) and the Economic Injury Disaster Loan (EIDL) funds by lying on applications for the aid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Business and nonprofit agencies\u2019 concerns about pandemic scams, ranging from vaccine fraud to financial games, are an FBI priority these days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s on top of the FBI\u2019s continuing focus on the security of information about businesses\u2019 products and systems, especially in Hampton Roads, which counts more than 650 defense contractors, big and small.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bowling\u2019s job is to encourage information to flow both ways \u2014 the FBI shares what it knows, and businesses what they\u2019re comfortable letting outsiders know.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019re not about compliance … Coca-Cola keeps its secret recipe in the vault, we\u2019re not interested in the ingredients of Col. Sanders\u2019 chicken,\u201d Bowling said. \u201cWhat we would like to know is where you keep your innovations, who has access, how does it move.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The job is a lot like that of auditors who review business and government accounts and processes \u2014 the focus is on prevention by finding gaps that open the possibility of crime or error.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou have to build trust,\u201d Bowling said. \u201cIt\u2019s not all about what we know \u2014 businesses are the subject matter experts about their business … some of my best moments are when I can gather corporations and you get Corporation A sharing something that could help Corporation B with some security issue.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He works with Fortune 1000 companies participating in the FBI\u2019s Domestic Security Alliance Council, which enables a two-way exchange of vetted information, as well as smaller firms and individuals that participate in the bureau\u2019s Infragard information portal and academic researchers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A key part of his job is helping businesses get in touch with FBI in-house specialists, whether on cybersecurity, fraud, counterintelligence or terrorism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His regular exchanges with businesses\u2019 security and information technology executives, as well as with chief executives, help the FBI learn about both new threats and the extent and mechanics of threats the bureau has already encountered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI really like working with Mom and Pops, someone who knows all about the special widget they\u2019ve created but needs to know how to protect their innovation,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a lot easier to steal something than to create and innovate,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019d much rather help out ahead of time than come in six months later to help clean up the mess.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOne of the bullets I love to get out to our partners is, economic security is national security, and companies can be victims, too,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Originally published by The Daily Press. When the FBI\u2019s Norfolk office cracked an early case of pandemic relief fraud last spring, private sector coordinator Randy Bowling set up sessions for his colleagues to brief many of the several hundred businesses he works with. His job is a twist on the Federal Bureau of Investigation\u2019s long […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5849,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blackopspartners.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5848"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blackopspartners.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blackopspartners.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blackopspartners.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blackopspartners.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5848"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blackopspartners.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5848\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blackopspartners.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5849"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blackopspartners.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5848"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blackopspartners.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5848"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blackopspartners.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5848"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}