This webinar was originally held on July 15, 2025 and is now available for on demand viewing.
Duration: 1 hour
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Summary
As high-profile assassinations and credible threats against corporate and political leaders escalate across the United States, traditional executive protection strategies are being tested—and found lacking. CEOs, board members, and public-private sector leaders are increasingly becoming deliberate targets of politically motivated violence, insider threats, and sophisticated attacks driven by global instability and domestic polarization.
Join us for this urgent, live web panel discussion featuring leading experts in executive protection, corporate security strategy, threat intelligence, and crisis management. This breaking news event will examine the current threat landscape and offer actionable strategies for safeguarding high-value individuals whose visibility and influence make them—and their organizations—at risk.
From risk forecasting to real-time response readiness, this conversation will challenge long-held assumptions and offer a roadmap for evolving protection programs to meet today’s realities.
Panel Discussion Topics:
- The resurgence of targeted violence: What’s driving the latest wave of CEO and public official attacks?
- Assessing organizational exposure: How to identify and secure high-risk executives and board members.
- Intelligence-led protection: Integrating threat intelligence, social media monitoring, and behavioral analysis.
- The cost of inaction: Legal, reputational, and operational risks tied to inadequate protection programs.
- Building a proactive EP strategy: Best practices in physical security, digital hygiene, and crisis response planning.
Speakers
Fred Burton
Advisor
Ontic
Fred Burton is one of the world’s foremost authorities on protective intelligence, security, and counterterrorism. As an advisor at Ontic, he provides security strategies and best practices to physical security leaders at major corporations, advising on how to optimize their security programs, streamline protective intelligence initiatives, and keep their people safe.
Burton is a former State Department counterterrorism deputy chief and special agent who orchestrated the 1995 arrest of Ramzi Yousef, the mastermind of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. Burton also conducted the debriefings of the U.S. hostages held in Lebanon. He investigated the plane crash that killed President Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq of Pakistan, the American ambassador, and a U.S. Army general in 1988. Burton, instrumental in the development of the State Dept.’s Rewards for Justice Program to target terrorists like Yousef and Osama Bin Laden, also investigated the assassination of Israeli President Rabin; the killing of Rabbi Meir Kahane; the al-Qaeda New York City bombing plots; the Libyan-backed terrorist attacks on American diplomats in Sana’a and Khartoum; and countless other terrorist attacks and threats around the globe.
In 2008, Burton was appointed to the Texas Border Security Council by Gov. Rick Perry and served as the assistant director of intelligence and counterterrorism for the Texas Department of Public Safety. Burton is the author of the bestselling memoir Ghost: Confessions of a Counterterrorism Agent (Random House, 2008); Chasing Shadows: A Special Agent’s Hunt to Bring a Cold War Assassin to Justice (Palgrave, 2011); and the New York Times bestseller Under Fire: The Untold Story of the Attack in Benghazi, which he co-authored with Samuel M. Katz (St. Martin’s Press, 2013). He also co-authored Beirut Rules: The Murder of a CIA Station Chief and Hezbollah’s War Against America with Samuel M. Katz (Random House/Penguin/Berkeley) in 2018. Two of his books have been optioned to Hollywood and one is currently in development by a major studio.
SVP of Global Intelligence
Sara Pratley is Senior Vice President of Global Intelligence for AlertMedia, a leading provider of risk intelligence and emergency communication solutions serving more than 3,500 customers in 150 countries. As the head of AlertMedia’s global intelligence organization, Sara’s is responsible for directing a global team of analysts, providing 24/7 coverage of the risk landscape to help clients identify, assess, and respond to threats occurring near their people, locations, and assets.
Ben Joelson
As the Head of Chertoff Group’s Security Risk & Resilience practice, Ben Joelson advises global companies and family offices on their complex security risks and challenges.
Some notable examples of Ben’s advisory practice include his review of multiple Fortune 500 executive protection programs, evaluating functional maturity, and crafting recommendations to ensure protection strategies are risk-based and effective. Ben also helped a Fortune 10 Client redesign its entire corporate security function—accounting for business risks, intuitive design principles, and ensuring effective security risk management in the volatile global threat environment.
Ben developed an industry-leading supply chain security program for a notable American OEM, personally assessing high-risk global manufacturing operations and developing an actionable, repeatable program for assessing, mitigating, and monitoring cross-border security threats.
In addition to corporate and physical security mandates, Ben lead’s the firm’s business resilience and enhanced due diligence business lines. In this capacity he helped develop an inaugural, global business resilience function for a Fortune 50 multinational corporation. He has led dozens of due diligence investigations throughout Latin America, Europe, Asia, and the Middle East, and regularly advises general counsel and senior decision-makers on political exposure and off-balance-sheet risk.
Ben also helps aerospace, defense, and security clients seeking to grow and diversify their businesses.
Over the last 15 years, Ben has held leadership roles in both the government and the private sector, including serving as the President of the International Defense & Aerospace Group and as a United States Air Force Security Forces and Antiterrorism Officer.
In government, Ben oversaw the security of our nation’s nuclear arsenal and designed, built, and led security programs in all threat environments—including within the Middle East, Europe, and North America. Ben also helped a prominent government agency establish its inaugural executive protection function and develop risk-based procedures for close protection of key executives.
Editorial Director
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