Analyze and evaluate the Prouty case, then construct remedial counter-measures to the U.S. Immigration and
Customs Enforcement (ICE), FBI and CIA vetting failures.
What stands out the most to me in this case is not just they missed some of her connections to Hezbollah
during her background check, but they also missed connections from family members as well. Of particular
concern is Prouty’s brother-in-law, Talil Khailil Chahine, who was wanted for a series of crimes, including
concealing some $20 million in cash and sending money to Lebanon. Chahine even attended a fund-raising
event, with Hezbollah’s former spiritual leader in attendance (Isikoff, 2007).
Even if there was no proof of espionage committed by Prouty, the thorough background checks, could have at
least shown the potential threat. That could have led to follow up questions to get a better understanding of
Prouty’s situation. After, the case and revealing the truth about fraudulent marriage and falsified documents,
makes Prouty look all the more guilty. Whether she was guilty of espionage or not, there needs to be more
countermeasures in place, that the Intelligence Community (IC) can apply (Federal Bureau of Investigation
How can the U.S. Intelligence Community best protect itself against the threat of potential counterintelligence
operations? These include more thorough background investigations and periodic reviews; regular personal
finance disclosure for national security officials and their families; and more frequent polygraphs. These efforts
do lead to more effective CI, but they do not entirely safeguard against the unique threat posed by Non-State
Actors. For example, given the sparse financial resources of many terrorist groups, they are unlikely to pay for
an insider’s services, and are more inclined to rely on ideological drivers to motivate recruits (Harber,2009).
Most importantly, perhaps no instrument of U.S. counterintelligence (CI) will bear more fruit than knowing the
intelligence targets and collection capabilities of its adversaries. The IC must be willing to go on the CI
offensive against terrorist elements—in particular the IC must work to infiltrate the networks and organizations
of violent Non-State Actors. Such aggressive CI tactics as offensive penetrations serve much the same
function as foreign intelligence collection: they reveal the capabilities of adversaries, their targeting
requirements, and the effectiveness of their operations. Perhaps most importantly, they can also create an
opportunity to impede hostile collection efforts through a variety of disinformation measures (Harber,2009).
WC:362
References
Michael Isikoff “Dangerous Liaisons,” Newsweek. 2007
Harber, Justin R. “Unconventional Spies: The Counterintelligence Threat from Non-State Actors”. International
Journal of Intelligence and CounterIntelligence. 2009
Department of Justice. “Former Employee of CIA and FBI Pleads Guilty to Conspiracy, Unauthorized Computer
Access and Naturalization Fraud.”
Analyze and evaluate the CIFA (Talon/Cornerstone) database failings, then hypothize on remedial measures to
ensure efficient and adequately maintained counter-intelligence databases.
The idea of CIFA (Talon/Cornerstone) was interesting and very useful for the purpose of evaluating potential
threats from possible international terrorist attacks to the DoD personnel or assets. The ability to acquire and
analyze suspicious activity reports for indications of possible terrorist pre-attack activities is an absolutely
critical component of the intelligence support to the force protection mission (Richelson,2007). The pre-attack
phase of a terrorist operation is the period of greatest vulnerability to the terrorist group, since it must surface to
collect intelligence and conduct physical surveillance and other activities of the target.
What made the database fail and lose value is that eventually more non-threating reports were being produced
and staying on the system longer than it should. There was a large quantity of information being retained on
the system that didn’t qualify for threat or force protection. One thing that could have contributed to that, is the
access granted to the system. There were nearly 30 organizations that had access to the Talon database,
along with over 3500 users that were authorized to submit Talon information reports to and access the
database (ACLU, 2007).
That being said the flaw was likely just in the policy and administration of the database. If the database
requirements were better put out and have guidelines on the input from the Intelligence Community, there
could have been a better way to organize the program and share the appropriate information. I still think it’s a
great tool and idea, but there will still have to be more guidance and structure on who and what we share to the
database. And have the information filtered in a timely manner, so that the intelligence shared can still be
actionable.
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