Lawrence Baldwin | Highlighted in the NY Times

Atlanta is on cybersecurity home front, and our incredible tech talent is making that possible. Lawrence Baldwin is the Chief Forensics Officer at Atlanta-based security firm myNetWatchman, and is world renowned for his work in network forensics and cyber-crime intelligence.

His specialties are:

• High-dollar cyber fraud analysis (ACH/wire fraud, stock and futures trading fraud, reshipping fraud, tax refund fraud, auction fraud, etc.)
• Cyber-criminal communication systems (botnet C&C, criminal anonymization infrastructure)
• Advanced malware analysis of financial services malware (Zeus, Spyeye, Bugat, etc.)
• Near and far-end money mule/money laundering systems
• Application of big data solutions to large-scale packet traffic analysis problems

Here’s some choice quotes from the recent piece on him in The New York Times:

• For the past seven years, several security consultants and former law enforcement personnel say, Mr. Baldwin has immersed himself in the so-called dark web, using what most describe as unorthodox methods to gather intelligence about online financial crime.
• It is that unusual proximity — and the reliable information that it produces — that has made Mr. Baldwin one of the go-to consultants for financial institutions.
• To his supporters, Mr. Baldwin, who has a degree in computer science from the University of Hartford, is something of a secret agent. “He has eyes directly on the perpetrator,” said one security expert who did not want to be identified because of Mr. Baldwin’s preference for a low profile.
• “Baldwin stands out because he provides actionable intelligence,” said Avivah Litan, a security analyst with Gartner, the research firm. “It’s exact, it’s original and he barely charges for it, whereas other firms repackage intelligence from many sources.”
• Thomas Grasso, a supervisory special agent with the F.B.I., said the bureau “had a very good working relationship with Mr. Baldwin and his company over the years,” and had worked with him and others in the private sector to stay ahead of online threats.
• Mr. Baldwin did not start out as a security guru. Early in his career he worked at BellSouth, helping to introduce its dial-up network. Immediately, hackers tried to break in. What began as a curiosity — figuring out who they were and how they attacked their victims — became his life’s work.

Read the entire article by Nicole Perlroth & Matthew Goldstein.

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