A good security firm will do a Google search on its client to see how much and what type of information comes up. The firm can then contact the disseminators of the information to make sure it is removed from public view.
If the client has an airplane, for example, it should not be named something that would easily identify the aircraft's owner, experts say. If you're Oprah Winfrey, you don't register your airplane under the name "Harpo, Inc." Anyone looking at an airplane's aviation records can tell which planes are coming and going from the small airports, and with that information they can determine who is likely to be flying in and out.
Most security firms will do a basic risk assessment of their client to determine where the holes are. They look at the individual's public profile: the level of his public prominence, the issues surrounding him in the public domain, the likelihood he will attract unwarranted attention. Those working in the financial sector, for instance, are vulnerable these days because so many people have lost their jobs, while those on Wall Street seem to be doing fairly well. Indeed, Dick Fuld, the former CEO of Lehman Brothers, was punched in the face while working out at Lehman Brothers' gym, just after the firm announced it was going bankrupt. AIG executives had protesters picketing outside their homes after their bonuses were announced.
A corporate communications employee at one financial firm says she spent half a day on the telephone pleading with The Wall Street Journal not to publish a photo of one of the firm's bankers if the paper was also going to publicly reveal the amount of his bonus. Some fear the fallout if New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo makes good on his threat to release bankers' bonus amounts if he is elected governor.
"There could be laid off employees, because of the poor practices of a particular company, and yet employees see the heads of those companies getting hundreds of thousands of dollars in bonuses. That can make those people who received bonuses potential targets," says Philip Farina, CEO of Farina and Associates, a Miami-based security firm that specializes in travel and hospitality. It's changed the mentality on Wall Street. Where some in the financial sector used to strut their accomplishments and wealth, many would now rather lay low, security sources say.
It's not just executives in financial services who are potential targets. Farina knew a corporate officer at a non-financial services company who began receiving death threats at her home from a disgruntled employee who'd been let go years earlier. The employee was identified before he was able to carry out those threats.
"Some people just wake up one day and say, 'This is the day I'm going to do something,' " Farina says.