As thousands of attendees roam the halls of the Walter E. Washington Convention Center during this year’s Association of the U.S. Army Annual Meeting & Exposition in Washington, a handful of agents with Army counterintelligence are working to keep the Army’s secrets safe.
“Now more than ever, our adversaries absolutely have a full court press on us in both the cyber domain and physical domain,” said Brig. Gen. Sean Stinchon, head of Army Counterintelligence Command. “They’re coming after our people, networks and critical infrastructure.”
Foreign agents attend shows such as AUSA, trying to collect sensitive information and exploit people, Stinchon said.
Scott Grovatt, region special agent in charge for the Northeast Region, told Army Times that his team collaborates with all levels of law enforcement to track possible incursions by foreign agents and actors.
“The Army is going through one of the largest transformations in the past 40 years, AI, autonomy, drones. The more industry is developing those capabilities, the more we are seeing the adversary gather, copy and mimic,” Grovatt said.
That’s why Grovatt’s team contacts each industry participant and ensures they know to reach out if anyone is asking overly technical questions or trying to photograph items that are not supposed to be photographed.
“We let them know about the threat, what emerges and that it changes every day,” Grovatt said.
There’s a before and after aspect to the work that counterintelligence does, Stinchon said. His agents break down by adversary the gaps they’re seeking to fill and collect intelligence on. Then counterintelligence builds its network on the ground at the conference against what it believes the adversary is trying to collect.
After the conference, his team will publish reports on the trends they observed and lessons learned for the next conference or event.
While the efforts are mostly focused on educating and contacting industry vendors, Stinchon welcomed anyone to report suspicious activity that they might witness at the show, such as individuals asking detailed technical questions or requesting specifications, or people taking photographs of items that were explicitly noted not to be photographed, for example.
Special Agent in Charge James, who declined to provide her first name due to security concerns, said that AUSA is one of the biggest shows that Army counterintelligence covers.
“We start prepping for this almost a year in advance,” she said.
And the work isn’t expected to slow down.
“The more advancements we make, the more it’s going to increase,” James said. “There hasn’t been a decline in the amount of foreign registrants at AUSA.”
Todd South has written about crime, courts, government and the military for multiple publications since 2004 and was named a 2014 Pulitzer finalist for a co-written project on witness intimidation. Todd is a Marine veteran of the Iraq War.