Other People’s Secrets

YOU’VE SEEN HIS FACE ON THE COVER OF TIME MAGAZINE, THIS BILLIONAIRE CEO, who says, “A hundred billion dollars are at stake. There has to be a bug in the conference room. We’re fighting a hostile takeover, and they made some sketchy inside moves that hurt us. Somehow they scored key information. Every one of us in that room has a lot to lose. It couldn’t be one of us. And if it is, well… that’s why you’re here.”

It’s the middle of the night. A big rain is blowing through the city. The giant glass tower is empty except for security guards. And you and the world-famous entrepreneur. He’s wearing golf clothes, you’re dressed in an old plastic raincoat like a homeless guy with a garbage bag.

His face isn’t smiling the way it was on the Time cover. He’s furious, worried, grim. “I don’t trust my own security people. Their sweeps showed nothing. Maybe they did the plant, if there is one… if we can crush this takeover crap, we’re meeting in Dubai, and before that, I’ve gotta know.”

You make him leave the room. Even his body’s faint electromagnetic field is too strong for the incredibly sensitive scanning codes in your laptop-based remote. You’ve adjusted for your own field and that took a full day of programming.

Walking out, he grinds his teeth, says, “Find the bug and I’m giving you a hundred-thousand-buck tip.”

You pull off the Goodwill raincoat. Your high-tech work overalls have tool and gear pockets, most of them full.

You clear your head and remove your gear bag from the garbage bag. You set up and boot up and calibrate the scanner remote… and you systematically begin your sweep.

You smile and remember the first bug you ever found, inside a curtain rod in a home kitchen, a cheap circuit board about the size of a quarter and powered by a 9-volt battery. An amateur’s bug for sure, but a bug no less. It’s on your key ring for good luck.

This is your life, bug sweeps, disguises, surveillance missions, clients sobbing in desperation. Expertise in polygraph testing, internal theft, domestic abuse cases.

You scan the luxurious surfaces of the Billionaire’s conference room walls, ceiling, tables, chairs, lamps, carpeting. You muse while you scan.

You met him when the company hired you to sweep his fleet of cars. You found six bugs, astonishing him. Then he asked you out to his mansion on the lake, and you found a dozen more. He liked you, bonused you, retained you.

Most of all, with your track record working for him, he trusts you. In fact, nobody else in his company even knows about you. He pays you by wire transfer. You wonder why he trusts you. His bonuses, maybe. Or the fact that he knows this— all you have, besides your knowledge, is your reputation for your loyalty to the client.

An hour goes by. The scans reveal nothing. With your remote so high it feeds back, still nothing. You trust the exotic gear, some of it you designed yourself.

Now you stop, put the gear down. You tell yourself… look around… empty your mind.

Across the gulf of space outside the building, another huge glass building glitters in the night. It’s walls face these walls. The rain is gone, and the tall office buildings steam from their vents. In the back of your mind, something is emerging…

Wham! A revelation hits you.

You grab your laptop and key in a new program. You rest your range-finding laser scanner on the desktop, pointed at that building, in a triaxial angled grid.

Suddenly, your laptop data screen jumps to life.

And you grin. You triangulate the signals, focusing them to a pinpoint.

On the sixth floor over there. Ninth office from the left. A vibration code scanner signal that reads choice pattern vibes from the conference room glass.

The next day your online banking shows a big wire deposit. And an e-mail request: “Traveling to Dubai next month. Need services to and from and there.”

You’re a PI.

A Private Investigator. A detective at the top of your game.

You’re on the high end, but you didn’t start there. You first earned a degree in criminology, and began at the bottom of the ladder… with divorce and child custody disputes.

Your world is nothing like you see on TV. You don’t chase cars, enter illegally, or chase people waving a gun. You are careful not to trespass, even. You’ve got a State detective’s license to protect, and an “agency operator’s license,” which permits you to be your own boss.

And a bad economy means ever more work for you.

You assist individuals, businesses, and attorneys by finding and analyzing information. You connect small clues to solve mysteries or to uncover facts about legal, financial, or personal matters. You offer many services, including executive, corporate, and celebrity protection; pre-employment verification; and individual background profiles.

Sometimes you investigate computer crimes, such as identity theft, harassing e-mails, and illegal downloading of copyrighted material. You also provide assistance in criminal and civil liability cases, insurance claims and fraud, child custody and protection cases, missing persons cases, and premarital screening.

Private detectives and investigators have many methods to choose from when determining the facts in a case. Much of their work is done using a computer, recovering deleted e-mails and documents, for example. They may also perform computer database searches or work with someone who does.

Computers allow investigators to quickly obtain huge amounts of information such as a subject’s prior arrests, convictions, and civil legal judgments; telephone numbers; motor vehicle registrations; association and club memberships; and even photographs.

Sometimes investigators go undercover, pretending to be someone else to get information or to observe a subject inconspicuously. Most detectives and investigators are trained to perform physical surveillance, which may be high-tech or low-tech. They may observe a site, such as the home of a subject, from an inconspicuous location or a vehicle. Using photographic and video cameras, binoculars, and cell phones, detectives often use surveillance to gather information on an individual; this can be quite time consuming.

Detectives and investigators must be mindful of the law when conducting investigations. They keep up with Federal, State, and local legislation, such as privacy laws and other legal issues affecting their work.

The legality of certain methods may be unclear, and investigators and detectives must have knowledge and training of law that a degree can greatly facilitate.

Private detectives and investigators often specialize. Those who focus on intellectual property theft, for example, investigate and document acts of piracy, help clients stop illegal activity, and provide intelligence for prosecution and civil action. Other investigators specialize in developing financial profiles and asset searches. Their reports reflect information gathered through interviews, investigation and surveillance, and research, including review of public documents.

Computer forensic investigators specialize in recovering, analyzing, and presenting data from computers for use in investigations or as evidence. They determine the details of intrusions into computer systems, recover data from encrypted or erased files, and recover e-mails and deleted passwords.

Legal investigators assist in preparing criminal defenses, locating witnesses, serving legal documents, interviewing police and prospective witnesses, and gathering and reviewing evidence. Legal investigators also may collect information on the parties to the litigation, take photographs, testify in court, and assemble evidence and reports for trials. They often work for law firms or lawyers.

Corporate investigators conduct internal and external investigations for corporations. In internal investigations, they may investigate drug use in the workplace, ensure that expense accounts are not abused, or determine whether employees are stealing merchandise or information. External investigations attempt to thwart criminal schemes from outside the corporation, such as fraudulent billing by a supplier.

Financial investigators may be hired to develop confidential financial profiles of individuals or companies that are prospective parties to large financial transactions. These investigators often are certified public accountants (CPAs) who work closely with investment bankers and other accountants. They might also search for assets in order to recover damages awarded by a court in fraud or theft cases.

Investigators generally work alone, but they sometimes work with others during surveillance or when following a subject in order to avoid detection by the subject. Some of the work involves confrontation, so the job can be stressful and dangerous. Some situations call for the investigator to be armed, such as certain bodyguard assignments for corporate or celebrity clients. In most cases, however, a weapon is not necessary because the purpose of the work is gathering information and not law enforcement or criminal apprehension. Owners of investigative agencies have the added stress of having to deal with demanding and sometimes distraught clients.

Private detectives and investigators often work irregular hours because of the need to conduct surveillance and contact people who are not available during normal working hours. Early morning, evening, weekend, and holiday work is common.

Most private detectives and investigators have some college education and previous experience in investigative work. In most States, they are required to be licensed.

There are no formal education requirements for most private detective and investigator jobs, although many of the top PI’s have college degrees.

Courses in criminal justice and police science are helpful to aspiring private detectives and investigators.

Although related experience is usually required, some people enter the occupation directly after graduation from college, generally with an associate or bachelor’s degree in criminal justice or police science.

The 2006 educational attainment for private detectives and investigators, in percent, was as follows:

Most corporate investigators must have a bachelor’s degree, preferably in a business-related field. Some corporate investigators have a master’s degree in business administration or a law degree; others are CPAs.

For computer forensics work, a computer science or accounting degree is more helpful than a criminal justice degree. An accounting degree provides good background knowledge for investigating fraud through computer forensics.

Either of these two degrees provides a good starting point after which investigative techniques can be learned on the job.

Alternatively, many colleges and universities now offer certificate programs, requiring from 15 to 21 credits, in computer forensics. These programs are most beneficial to law enforcement officers, paralegals, or others who are already involved in investigative work. A few colleges and universities now offer bachelor’s or master’s degrees in computer forensics, and others are planning to begin offering such degrees.

Most of the work of private detectives and investigators is learned on the job. New investigators will usually start by learning how to use databases to gather information. The training they receive depends on the type of firm. At an insurance company, a new investigator will learn to recognize insurance fraud. At a firm that specializes in domestic cases, a new worker might observe a senior investigator performing surveillance. Learning by doing, in which new investigators are put on cases and gain skills as they go, is a common approach. Corporate investigators hired by large companies, however, may receive formal training in business practices, management structure, and various finance-related topics.

Because they work with changing technologies, computer forensic investigators never stop training. They learn the latest methods of fraud detection and new software programs and operating systems by attending conferences and courses offered by software vendors and professional associations.

The majority of States and the District of Columbia require private detectives and investigators to be licensed. Licensing requirements vary, however. Seven States—Alabama, Alaska, Colorado, Idaho, Mississippi, Missouri, and South Dakota—have no Statewide licensing requirements, some States have few requirements, and many others have stringent regulations.

A degree can push your chances radically forward. For example, the Bureau of Security and Investigative Services of the California Department of Consumer Affairs requires private investigators to be 18 years of age or older; have a combination of education in police science, criminal law, or justice and experience equaling 3 years (6,000 hours); pass a criminal history background check by the California Department of Justice and the FBI (in most States, convicted felons cannot be issued a license); and receive a qualifying score on a 2-hour written examination covering laws and regulations.

Detectives and investigators in all States who carry handguns must meet additional requirements for a firearms permit.

There are no licenses specifically for computer forensic investigators, but some States require them to be licensed private investigators. Even where licensure is not required, a private investigator license is useful to some because it allows them to perform follow-up or complementary tasks.

Private detectives and investigators typically have previous experience in other occupations. Some have worked in other occupations for insurance or collections companies, in the private security industry, or as paralegals.

Many investigators enter the field after serving in law enforcement, the military, government auditing and investigative positions, or Federal intelligence jobs. Former law enforcement officers, military investigators, and government agents, who are frequently able to retire after 25 years of service, often become private detectives or investigators in a second career.

Others enter from jobs in finance, accounting, commercial credit, investigative reporting, insurance, and law. These individuals often can apply their prior work experience in a related investigative specialty.

Most computer forensic investigators learn their trade while working for a law enforcement agency, either as a sworn officer or a civilian computer forensic analyst. They are trained at their agency’s computer forensics training program. Many people enter law enforcement specifically to get this training and establish a reputation before moving to the private sector.

For private detective and investigator jobs, most employers look for individuals with ingenuity, persistence, and assertiveness. A candidate must not be afraid of confrontation, should communicate well, and should be able to think on his or her feet. Good interviewing and interrogation skills also are important and usually are acquired in earlier careers in law enforcement or other fields. Because the courts often are the judge of a properly conducted investigation, the investigator must be able to present the facts in a manner that a jury will believe. The screening process for potential employees typically includes a background check for a criminal history.

Some investigators receive certification from a professional organization to demonstrate competency in a field. For example, the National Association of Legal Investigators confers the Certified Legal Investigator designation to licensed investigators who devote a majority of their practice to negligence or criminal defense investigations. To receive the designation, applicants must satisfy experience, educational, and continuing-training requirements and must pass written and oral exams.

ASIS, a trade organization for the security industry, offers the Professional Certified Investigator certification. To qualify, applicants must have a high school diploma or equivalent; have 5 years of investigations experience, including 2 years managing investigations; and must pass an exam.

Most private-detective agencies are small, with little room for advancement. Usually, there are no defined ranks or steps, so advancement takes the form of increases in salary and assignment status. Many detectives and investigators start their own firms after gaining a few years of experience. Corporate and legal investigators may rise to supervisor or manager of the security or investigations department.

Private detectives and investigators held about 52,000 jobs in 2006. About 30 percent were self-employed, including many for whom investigative work was a second job.

Around 34 percent of detective and investigator jobs were in investigation and security services, including private detective agencies, while another 9 percent were in department or other general merchandise stores. The rest worked mostly in State and local government, legal services firms, employment services companies, insurance agencies, and credit mediation establishments, including banks and other depository institutions.

Sharp competition is expected for most jobs despite faster-than-average employment growth. A degree is definitely a plus.

Employment of private detectives and investigators is expected to grow 18 percent over the 2006-16 decade, faster than the average for all occupations. Increased demand for private detectives and investigators will result from heightened security concerns, increased litigation, and the need to protect confidential information and property of all kinds.

The proliferation of criminal activity on the Internet, such as identity theft, spamming, e-mail harassment, and illegal downloading of copyrighted materials, will also increase the demand for private investigators.

Employee background checks, conducted by private investigators, will become standard for an increasing number of jobs.

Growing financial activity worldwide will increase the demand for investigators— to control internal and external financial losses, to monitor competitors, and to prevent industrial spying.

There will be many increasing opportunities at the entry level. Build from there, and work your way up the ladder.

Begin with your degree in Criminal Justice, Police Science, Criminology, or Computer Forensics.

A career as Private Investigator, Legal Investigator, Corporate Investigator, or Financial Investigator, is yours for the earning.

Every day will be an adventure, good or bad. You’ll never be bored!

For information on local licensing requirements, contact your State Department of Public Safety, State Division of Licensing, or local or State police headquarters.

For information on a career as a legal investigator and about the Certified Legal Investigator credential, contact:

• National Association of Legal Investigators, 908 21st St., Sacramento, CA 95814-3118. http://www.nalionline.org

For more information about investigative and other security careers, about the Professional Certified Investigator credential, and for a list of colleges and universities offering security-related courses and majors, contact:

• ASIS, 1625 Prince St., Alexandria, VA 22314-2818. http://www.asisonline.org

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