NEW YORK (AP) — He is one of the world's most famous and widely admired corporate leaders. But it's the haters that companies like Mark Zuckerberg's Meta are concerned about.
As online anger and social tensions increasingly become directed at the companies consumers rely on, Meta Inc. last year announced a move to protect the safety of Mr. Zuckerberg and the company's former chief operating officer. , spent $24.4 million on security guards, alarms and other measures.
Some famous CEOs have security around them. but, This week's mass shootings United Healthcare CEO brian thompson As he walked alone on a New York City sidewalk, he highlighted the wide variety of approaches companies take to protect their leaders from threats.
Thompson had no personal security and apparently knew nothing. Lurking Archer before he was shot.
And today's political, economic and technological climate will make it even more difficult to assess threats to business owners and take steps to protect them, experts say.
“We're getting better at collecting signals today, and I don't know if we'll ever be able to understand any more of the signals we collect,” said Fred Burton of Ontic, a company that provides threat management software for enterprises. says Mr.
After Thompson's shooting, Burton said, “I was on the phone all day consulting with several organizations and saying, 'Am I doing enough?'”
Some of America's largest companies, particularly those in the high-tech sector, spend significant amounts of money on the personal and residential security of their executives.
Meta, the company behind Facebook and Instagram, reported spending the most on executive personal security last year, according to a report compiled by research firm Equilar.
Zuckerberg is “synonymous with meta, and as a result, negative sentiment toward our company is directly related to and often transferred to Mr. Zuckerberg,” the Menlo Park, Calif., company said earlier this year. This was first explained in the annual shareholder disclosure.
Tim Cook, CEO of Apple, the world's largest technology company by stock valuation. I'm being harassed by a stalker Before the company's security team succeeded in taking legal action against her in 2022, she sent him sexually provocative emails and at one point appeared outside his Silicon Valley home. It even happened.
Cook is regularly accompanied by a security guard when he makes public appearances. Still, the $820,000 the company allocated last year to protect its executives is only a fraction of what other tech giants have spent on CEO security.
More than a quarter of Fortune 500 companies reported spending money to protect their CEOs and other executives. Among those people, the median amount paid for personal safety has doubled over the past three years to about $98,000.
Many companies consider investor meetings, like the one UnitedHealthcare's Mr. Thompson was walking to when he was shot, to be highly risky because details about the location and speakers are widely publicized. has been done.
“This gives people a chance to arrive well in advance, see the rooms and see how people will get in and out of the location,” said Dave Komendat, president of DSKomendat Risk Management Services. says. In the greater Seattle area.
Some companies are responding by beefing up their security. For example, technology companies routinely require everyone attending major events, such as Apple's annual launch of the next iPhone or shareholder meetings, to pass through an airport-style security checkpoint before entering.
Some companies are refraining from holding in-person meetings with shareholders, such as Amazon, which held its annual shareholder meeting virtually.
“But there are also corporate cultures that really frown on that and want their leaders to be accessible to people, shareholders and employees,” Komendat said.
Depending on the company, such an approach may make sense. Many top executives are largely unknown to the public and operate in industries and locations that are less exposed to public visibility and threats.
“Determining the need for and appropriate level of executive-level protection programs is unique to each organization,” said David Johnston, vice president of asset protection and retail operations at the National Retail Federation. “These safety measures should also include continuous monitoring for potential threats and the ability to adapt to maintain appropriate levels of security and safety.”
Komendat said some organizations also have protective intelligence that uses digital tools such as machine learning and artificial intelligence to scrutinize online comments and detect threats on social media platforms such as X as well as the dark web. A group exists. They look at what is being said about the company, its employees, and leadership to uncover risks.
“Threats against senior corporate leaders always exist, many of which are not credible,” Komendat said. “The challenge is always determining what is a real threat or is it just venting without any intention of taking any additional action.”
Burton, a former special agent with the U.S. Diplomatic Security Service, points out that despite the current climate, there are very few organized groups targeting companies.
One of the main concerns today is lonely people being fed online abuse by like-minded others. It's up to the company's security analysts to focus on such interactions and determine if they are a real threat.
And CEOs aren't the only targets of dissatisfied customers. According to the National Safety Council, there were 525 workplace fatalities due to assault in the United States in 2022. The group says industries such as healthcare, education and service providers are more prone to violence than other industries, with taxi drivers more than 20 times more likely to be killed on the job than other workers. That's what it means.
But Mr. Thompson's ambush at UnitedHealthcare this week may raise suspicions among some CEOs.
“What always happens in moments like this is that security experts are increasingly listened to as they seek funding to better protect their executives,” Burton said.
“Because I can guarantee you that there is not a CEO in America who doesn't know about this incident.”
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Associated Press writers Anne D’Innocenzio and Hallelujah Hadero in New York contributed.
