FBI warns Schools To Be On the Lookout for Spies

Federal agents are warning leaders at some of the New England's top universities to be on the lookout for foreign spies or potential terrorists trying to steal their research, the head of the FBI's Boston office warned yesterday.^[1]

FBI agents met recently with officials at Harvard University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of Massachusetts and other schools to train professors, students and security staff on how to recognize anyone who might be trying to exploit research, Special Agent in Charge Warren Bamford said.^[2] Agents plan to visit many more New England colleges in the coming months and are offering to provide briefings about what they call "espionage indicators" to faculty, students, or security staff as part of a national outreach to college campuses.^[3]

Bamford stressed that the FBI is not seeking to censor information or to stop the free flow of information, they just want to raise awareness because colleges, as open communities, are vulnerable to those looking to exploit the information they can gain and use it against the United States.^[4] "What we're most concerned about are those things that are not classified being developed by MIT, Worcester Polytech, and other universities....the academic community is designed to be open, and we just have to make the community aware [of the risks involved]," Bamford asserted.^[5]

Worcester Polytechnic Institute President Dennis Berkey said the FBI told researchers to protect laptops, especially in foreign countries, and to be wary about who contacts them about their work, "[t]he general point was, if there is unnatural or unexplained interest in your research and you're nervous about it, here's how to be in touch with us."^[6]

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^[1] Shelley Murphy and Marcella Bombardieri, FBI warns colleges of terror threat, Boston Globe, June 12, 2007, available at http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2007/06/12/fbi_warns_colleges_of_terror_threat// (last visited June 12, 2007).
^[2] AP Staff, FBI warns universities to watch out for spies, Associated Press Newswire, June 12, 2007, available at LEXIS, News Library, Wire News Services File.
^[3] Murphy and Bombardieri, supra note 1.
^[4] AP Staff, supra note 2.
^[5] Murphy and Bombardieri, supra note 1.
^[6] AP Staff, supra note 2.