Internal threats: McAfee sued three of its sales employees for alleged leaks of secrets

Internal Threats: McAfee Sued Three Sales Employees for Alleged Leaks of Secrets

McAfee filed a lawsuit against three former staff members over an alleged conspiracy to steal trade secrets for the benefit of their new employer, rival firm Tanium.

According to CyberScoop, the court case — filed with the Eastern District Court of Texas — states that Jennifer Kinney, Alan Coe, and Percy Tejeda, highly positioned sales personnel who knew the company’s “secret sauce” in sales tactics and business strategy, allegedly conspired to steal confidential information.

Possible Motivations

The motivations for an internal threat of this type can vary:

• Financial gain
• Revenge
• Political alliances

In the alleged McAfee incident, the employees in question may have been motivated to gain a competitive advantage for their new employer.

Industries such as cybersecurity are highly competitive and lucrative, creating strong incentives for both individuals and companies to leak and share confidential data.

The Nature of the Threat

Internal threats can come from anyone who works with confidential data. The former McAfee employees were not considered privileged users, but they regularly handled critical sales agreements and private business information.

Organizations must recognize that their “secret sauce” includes sales, pricing, and marketing strategies, not just manufacturing designs and software code. McAfee viewed the information allegedly stolen as part of its intellectual property.

Kymatio’s Comment

The McAfee incident clearly points to the need for a better internal threat management approach.

In this case, several Insider Risk Group (IRG) vectors could have been monitored:

• Job dissatisfaction
• Loss of salary effectiveness
• Disengagement

Monitoring these indicators could have enabled a risk mitigation strategy and prevented a harmful event for both company and employees.

What has your team done to detect warning signs and investigate internal threats?

More information:

• CyberScoop – McAfee lawsuit over “secret sauce”
• ZDNet – McAfee sues former employees

Contact Kymatio for more on prevention and mitigation of insider threats.