Compliance Hot Spots: DOJ's Cyber Whistleblower Campaign + Main Justice's Split from a Trump Loyalist
The Justice Department is seeking to crack down on federal contractors with lax cybersecurity procedures—and it wants whistleblowers to help.
October 14, 2021 at 02:39 PM
12 minute read
Compliance Hot Spots
Welcome to Compliance Hot Spots, our weekly snapshot on white-collar, regulatory and compliance news and trends. I hope you're having a better week than the Maryland couple caught by the FBI allegedly trying to spread nuclear secrets in a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. In other enforcement news, today we examine new initiatives from the Justice Department on cybersecurity fraud and cryptocurrency and look at the attorneys Trump DOJ officials turned to as the Senate Judiciary Committee probed allegations of a post-election pressure campaign. Thanks for reading, and please get in touch with tips and feedback. Contact me at [email protected] and @AGoudsward on Twitter.
Lisa O. Monaco, Deputy Attorney General at the U.S. Department of Justice, testifies before the Senate Judiciary Committee during a hearing entitled "Renewing and Strengthening the Violence Against Women Act," on October 5, 2021. Photo: Diego M. Radzinschi/ALM DOJ Signals Whistleblowers to Police Cyber Fraud
The Justice Department is seeking to crack down on federal contractors with lax cybersecurity procedures—and it wants whistleblowers to help.
Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco announced last week a new initiative that would use the False Claims Act to target cybersecurity related fraud by government contractors and grant recipients. The False Claims Act allows whistleblowers with knowledge of fraud against the government to sue in the government's name and, if successful, collect a portion of the damages.
"For too long, companies have chosen silence under the mistaken belief that it is less risky to hide a breach than to bring it forward and to report it," Monaco said in a statement announcing the initiative. "Well that changes today. We are announcing today that we will use our civil enforcement tools to pursue companies, those who are government contractors who receive federal funds, when they fail to follow required cybersecurity standards—because we know that puts all of us at risk. This is a tool that we have to ensure that taxpayer dollars are used appropriately and guard the public fisc and public trust."
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- Murphy & McGonigle
- Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner
- Debevoise & Plimpton
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- Womble Bond Dickinson
- Browne George Ross LLP
- Baker, Donelson, Bearman, Caldwell & Berkowitz, PC
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Who Got The Work
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Who Got The Work
Attorneys from A&O Shearman has stepped in as defense counsel for Toronto-Dominion Bank and other defendants in a pending securities class action. The suit, filed Dec. 11 in New York Southern District Court by Bleichmar Fonti & Auld, accuses the defendants of concealing the bank's 'pervasive' deficiencies in regards to its compliance with the Bank Secrecy Act and the quality of its anti-money laundering controls. The case, assigned to U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian, is 1:24-cv-09445, Gonzalez v. The Toronto-Dominion Bank et al.
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Crown Castle International, a Pennsylvania company providing shared communications infrastructure, has turned to Luke D. Wolf of Gordon Rees Scully Mansukhani to fend off a pending breach-of-contract lawsuit. The court action, filed Nov. 25 in Michigan Eastern District Court by Hooper Hathaway PC on behalf of The Town Residences LLC, accuses Crown Castle of failing to transfer approximately $30,000 in utility payments from T-Mobile in breach of a roof-top lease and assignment agreement. The case, assigned to U.S. District Judge Susan K. Declercq, is 2:24-cv-13131, The Town Residences LLC v. T-Mobile US, Inc. et al.
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Wilfred P. Coronato and Daniel M. Schwartz of McCarter & English have stepped in as defense counsel to Electrolux Home Products Inc. in a pending product liability lawsuit. The court action, filed Nov. 26 in New York Eastern District Court by Poulos Lopiccolo PC and Nagel Rice LLP on behalf of David Stern, alleges that the defendant's refrigerators’ drawers and shelving repeatedly break and fall apart within months after purchase. The case, assigned to U.S. District Judge Joan M. Azrack, is 2:24-cv-08204, Stern v. Electrolux Home Products, Inc.
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