Assistant Attorney General for National Security Matthew G. Olsen Delivers Remarks Announcing Disruptive Technology Strike Force Cases

Good morning. I am Matt Olsen, the Assistant Attorney General for National Security. Thank you all very much for being here.

I am joined by Matt Axelrod, the Assistant Secretary for Export Enforcement at the Department of Commerce.

Exactly three months ago, we launched the Disruptive Technology Strike Force. This is an interagency enforcement effort led by the Departments of Justice and Commerce. The FBI and Homeland Security Investigations, our law enforcement partners who are integral to this effort, are also represented here on stage. I also want to thank the Attorney General and the Deputy Attorney General for their support of our work.

The mission of the Strike Force is to prevent foreign adversaries from obtaining critical advanced technologies. We have established 14 local cells around the country – more than a third of which are represented here today on stage – to investigate and prosecute violations of U.S. laws.

Our work is supported by an interagency team of data analysts who identify gaps in enforcement and prioritize our lines of effort. Collectively, our work is critical to defend U.S. military readiness, to preserve our technological advantage over our adversaries, and to protect human rights and democratic values worldwide.

Five U.S. Attorneys from around the country are here with us: Breon Peace, of the Eastern District of New York; Gary Restaino, of the District of Arizona; Martín Estrada, of the Central District of California; Ismail Ramsey, of Northern District of California; and Damian Williams, of the Southern District of New York.

Today, we are announcing five cases from each of these districts. The cases – which were brought by the U.S. Attorneys’ Offices in partnership with the National Security Division – span a range of emerging technologies and malicious actors.

These cases demonstrate the breadth and complexity of the threats we face, as well as what is at stake. They show our ability to accelerate investigations and surge our collective resources to defend against these threats.

As you’ll hear more about in a moment, two of the five cases involve dismantling alleged procurement networks created to help the Russian military and intelligence services obtain sensitive technologies in violation of U.S. export-control laws. These technologies include military tactical equipment, airplane braking technology, and quantum cryptography.

Two other cases charge former software engineers with stealing software and hardware source code from U.S. tech companies in order to market it to Chinese competitors – including, in one of the cases, Chinese state-owned enterprises. The stolen code is alleged to be trade secrets used by the U.S. companies to develop self-driving cars and advanced automated manufacturing equipment.

The final case charges a Chinese national with violating U.S. sanctions in attempting to sell to Iran materials used to produce weapons of mass destruction. The defendant tried to arrange the sale using two Chinese companies that the U.S. government has sanctioned for supporting Iran’s ballistic missile program.

We stand vigilant in enforcing U.S. laws to stop the flow of sensitive technologies to our foreign adversaries. And that means using everything – from our criminal investigations and prosecutions to administrative enforcement actions to private sector outreach.

So let me be clear: we are committed to doing all we can to prevent these advanced tools from falling into the hands of foreign adversaries, who wield them in ways that threaten not only our nation’s security, but democratic values everywhere.

And with that, let me turn it over to Assistant Secretary Axelrod, and then to the U.S. Attorneys to discuss these prosecutions.