TY for the head's up, Doreen. Everyone should take note of this.
Visual Purple wrote:
> Exclusive! The FBI Deputizes Business
> By Matthew Rothschild, February 7, 2008
>
> Today, more than 23,000 representatives of private industry are
> working quietly with the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security.
> The members of this rapidly growing group, called InfraGard, receive
> secret warnings of terrorist threats before the public does--and, at
> least on one occasion, before elected officials. In return, they
> provide information to the government, which alarms the ACLU. But
> there may be more to it than that. One business executive, who showed
> me his InfraGard card, told me they have permission to "shoot to kill"
> in the event of martial law.
> InfraGard is "a child of the FBI," says Michael Hershman, the chairman
> of the advisory board of the InfraGard National Members Alliance and
> CEO of the Fairfax Group, an international consulting firm.
> InfraGard started in Cleveland back in 1996, when the private sector
> there cooperated with the FBI to investigate cyber threats.
> "Then the FBI cloned it," says Phyllis Schneck, chairman of the board
> of directors of the InfraGard National Members Alliance, and the prime
> mover behind the growth of InfraGard over the last several years.
> InfraGard itself is still an FBI operation, with FBI agents in each
> state overseeing the local InfraGard chapters. (There are now eighty-
> six of them.) The alliance is a nonprofit organization of private
> sector InfraGard members.
> "We are the owners, operators, and experts of our critical
> infrastructure, from the CEO of a large company in agriculture or high
> finance to the guy who turns the valve at the water utility," says
> Schneck, who by day is the vice president of research integration at
> Secure Computing.
> "At its most basic level, InfraGard is a partner****p between the
> Federal Bureau of Investigation and the private sector," the InfraGard
> website states. "InfraGard chapters are geographically linked with FBI
> Field Office territories."
> In November 2001, InfraGard had around 1,700 members. As of late
> January, InfraGard had 23,682 members, according to its website,
> www.infragard.net, which adds that "350 of our nation's Fortune 500
> have a representative in InfraGard."
> To join, each person must be sponsored by "an existing InfraGard
> member, chapter, or partner organization." The FBI then vets the
> applicant. On the application form, prospective members are asked
> which aspect of the critical infrastructure their organization deals
> with. These include: agriculture, banking and finance, the chemical
> industry, defense, energy, food, information and telecommunications,
> law enforcement, public health, and trans****tation.
> FBI Director Robert Mueller addressed an InfraGard convention on
> August 9, 2005. At that time, the group had less than half as many
> members as it does today. "To date, there are more than 11,000 members
> of InfraGard," he said. "From our perspective that amounts to 11,000
> contacts . . . and 11,000 partners in our mission to protect America."
> He added a little later, "Those of you in the private sector are the
> first line of defense."
> He urged InfraGard members to contact the FBI if they "note suspicious
> activity or an unusual event." And he said they could sic the FBI on
> "disgruntled employees who will use knowledge gained on the job
> against their employers."
> In an interview with InfraGard after the conference, which is featured
> prominently on the InfraGard members' website, Mueller says: "It's a
> great program."
> The ACLU is not so sanguine.
> "There is evidence that InfraGard may be closer to a cor****ate TIPS
> program, turning private-sector cor****ations--some of which may be in a
> position to observe the activities of millions of individual customers--
> into surrogate eyes and ears for the FBI," the ACLU warned in its
> August 2004 re****t The Surveillance-Industrial Complex: How the
> American Government Is Conscripting Businesses and Individuals in the
> Construction of a Surveillance Society.
> InfraGard is not readily accessible to the general public. Its
> communications with the FBI and Homeland Security are beyond the reach
> of the Freedom of Information Act under the "trade secrets" exemption,
> its website says. And any conversation with the public or the media is
> supposed to be carefully rehearsed.
> "The interests of InfraGard must be protected whenever presented to
> non-InfraGard members," the website states. "During interviews with
> members of the press, controlling the image of InfraGard being
> presented can be difficult. Proper preparation for the interview will
> minimize the risk of embarrassment. . . . The InfraGard leader****p and
> the local FBI representative should review the submitted questions,
> agree on the predilection of the answers, and identify the appropriate
> interviewee. . . . Tailor answers to the expected audience. . . .
> Questions concerning sensitive information should be avoided."
> One of the advantages of InfraGard, according to its leading members,
> is that the FBI gives them a heads-up on a secure ****tal about any
> threatening information related to infrastructure disruption or
> terrorism.
> The InfraGard website advertises this. In its list of benefits of
> joining InfraGard, it states: "Gain access to an FBI secure
> communication network complete with VPN encrypted website, webmail,
> listservs, message boards, and much more."
> InfraGard members receive "almost daily updates" on threats "emanating
> from both domestic sources and overseas," Hershman says.
> "We get very easy access to secure information that only goes to
> InfraGard members," Schneck says. "People are happy to be in the
> know."
> On November 1, 2001, the FBI had information about a potential threat
> to the bridges of California. The alert went out to the InfraGard
> member****p. Enron was notified, and so, too, was Barry Davis, who
> worked for Morgan Stanley. He notified his brother Gray, the governor
> of California.
> "He said his brother talked to him before the FBI," recalls Steve
> Maviglio, who was Davis's press secretary at the time. "And the
> governor got a lot of grief for releasing the information. In his
> defense, he said, 'I was on the phone with my brother, who is an
> investment banker. And if he knows, why shouldn't the public know?' "
> Maviglio still sounds perturbed about this: "You'd think an elected
> official would be the first to know, not the last."
> In return for being in the know, InfraGard members cooperate with the
> FBI and Homeland Security. "InfraGard members have contributed to
> about 100 FBI cases," Schneck says. "What InfraGard brings you is
> reach into the regional and local communities. We are a 22,000-member
> vetted body of subject-matter experts that reaches across seventeen
> matrixes. All the different stovepipes can connect with InfraGard."
> Schneck is proud of the relation****ps the InfraGard Members Alliance
> has built with the FBI. "If you had to call 1-800-FBI, you probably
> wouldn't bother," she says. "But if you knew Joe from a local meeting
> you had with him over a donut, you might call them. Either to give or
> to get. We want everyone to have a little black book."
> This black book may come in handy in times of an emergency. "On the
> back of each member****p card," Schneck says, "we have all the numbers
> you'd need: for Homeland Security, for the FBI, for the cyber center.
> And by calling up as an InfraGard member, you will be listened to."
> She also says that members would have an easier time obtaining a
> "special telecommunications card that will enable your call to go
> through when others will not."
> This special status concerns the ACLU.
> "The FBI should not be creating a privileged class of Americans who
> get special treatment," says Jay Stanley, public education director of
> the ACLU's technology and liberty program. "There's no 'business
> class' in law enforcement. If there's information the FBI can share
> with 22,000 cor****ate bigwigs, why don't they just share it with the
> public? That's who their real 'special relation****p' is supposed to be
> with. Secrecy is not a party favor to be given out to friends. . . .
> This bears a disturbing resemblance to the FBI's handing out 'goodies'
> to cor****ations in return for folding them into its domestic
> surveillance machinery."
> When the government raises its alert levels, InfraGard is in the loop.
> For instance, in a press release on February 7, 2003, the Secretary of
> Homeland Security and the Attorney General announced that the national
> alert level was being raised from yellow to orange. They then listed
> "additional steps" that agencies were taking to "increase their
> protective measures." One of those steps was to "provide alert
> information to InfraGard program."
> "They're very much looped into our readiness capability," says Amy
> Kudwa, spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security. "We
> provide speakers, as well as do joint presentations [with the FBI]. We
> also train alongside them, and they have participated in readiness
> exercises."
> On May 9, 2007, George Bush issued National Security Presidential
> Directive 51 entitled "National Continuity Policy." In it, he
> instructed the Secretary of Homeland Security to coordinate with
> "private sector owners and operators of critical infrastructure, as
> appropriate, in order to provide for the delivery of essential
> services during an emergency."
> Asked if the InfraGard National Members Alliance was involved with
> these plans, Schneck said it was "not directly participating at this
> point." Hershman, chairman of the group's advisory board, however,
> said that it was.
> InfraGard members, sometimes hundreds at a time, have been used in
> "national emergency preparation drills," Schneck acknowledges.
> "In case something happens, everybody is ready," says Norm Arendt, the
> head of the Madison, Wisconsin, chapter of InfraGard, and the safety
> director for the consulting firm Short Elliott Hendrickson, Inc.
> "There's been lots of discussions about what happens under an
> emergency."
> One business owner in the United States tells me that InfraGard
> members are being advised on how to prepare for a martial law situation
> --and what their role might be. He showed me his InfraGard card, with
> his name and e-mail address on the front, along with the InfraGard
> logo and its slogan, "Partner****p for Protection." On the back of the
> card were the emergency numbers that Schneck mentioned.
> This business owner says he attended a small InfraGard meeting where
> agents of the FBI and Homeland Security discussed in astoni****ng
> detail what InfraGard members may be called upon to do.
> "The meeting started off innocuously enough, with the speakers talking
> about cor****ate espionage," he says. "From there, it just progressed.
> All of a sudden we were knee deep in what was expected of us when
> martial law is declared. We were expected to share all our resources,
> but in return we'd be given specific benefits." These included, he
> says, the ability to travel in restricted areas and to get people out.
> But that's not all.
> "Then they said when--not if--martial law is declared, it was our
> responsibility to protect our ****tion of the infrastructure, and if we
> had to use deadly force to protect it, we couldn't be prosecuted," he
> says.
> I was able to confirm that the meeting took place where he said it
> had, and that the FBI and Homeland Security did make presentations
> there. One InfraGard member who attended that meeting denies that the
> subject of lethal force came up. But the whistleblower is 100 percent
> certain of it. "I have nothing to gain by telling you this, and
> everything to lose," he adds. "I'm so nervous about this, and I'm not
> someone who gets nervous."
> Though Schneck says that FBI and Homeland Security agents do make
> presentations to InfraGard, she denies that InfraGard members would
> have any civil patrol or law enforcement functions. "I have never
> heard of InfraGard members being told to use lethal force anywhere,"
> Schneck says.
> The FBI adamantly denies it, also. "That's ridiculous," says Catherine
> Milhoan, an FBI spokesperson. "If you want to quote a businessperson
> saying that, knock yourself out. If that's what you want to print,
> fine."
> But one other InfraGard member corroborated the whistleblower's
> account, and another would not deny it.
> Christine Moerke is a business continuity consultant for Alliant
> Energy in Madison, Wisconsin. She says she's an InfraGard member, and
> she confirms that she has attended InfraGard meetings that went into
> the details about what kind of civil patrol function--including
> engaging in lethal force--that InfraGard members may be called upon to
> perform.
> "There have been discussions like that, that I've heard of and
> participated in," she says.
> Curt Haugen is CEO of S'Curo Group, a company that does "strategic
> planning, business continuity planning and disaster recovery, physical
> and IT security, policy development, internal control, personnel
> selection, and travel safety," according to its website. Haugen tells
> me he is a former FBI agent and that he has been an InfraGard member
> for many years. He is a huge booster. "It's the only true organization
> where there is the public-private partner****p," he says. "It's all who
> knows who. You know a face, you trust a face. That's what makes it
> work."
> He says InfraGard "absolutely" does emergency preparedness exercises.
> When I ask about discussions the FBI and Homeland Security have had
> with InfraGard members about their use of lethal force, he says: "That
> much I cannot comment on. But as a private citizen, you have the right
> to use force if you feel threatened."
> "We were assured that if we were forced to kill someone to protect our
> infrastructure, there would be no repercussions," the whistleblower
> says. "It gave me goose bumps. It chilled me to the bone."
>
> Matthew Rothschild is the editor of The Progressive magazine and the
> author of "You Have No Rights: Stories of America in an Age of
> Repression." This article, "The FBI Deputizes Business," is the cover
> story of the March issue
>
> Source: http://tinyurl.com/yraxzj
>
> Also see: http://www.infragard.net/
> D2
>
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