(2008) Retired Brigadier General Hanan Gefen, a former commander of Unit 8200, noted his former organization’s influence on Comverse, which owns Verint, as well as other Israeli companies that dominate the U.S. eavesdropping and surveillance market. “Take NICE, Comverse and
Check Point for example, three of the largest high-tech companies, which were all directly influenced by 8200 technology,” said Gefen. “Check Point was founded by Unit alumni. Comverse’s main product, the Logger, is based on the Unit’s technology.”

Check Point, a large Israeli-based company that sells firewalls and other Internet security software from an office in Redwood City, California, was founded by Unit 8200 veteran Gil Shwed. Today the four years he spent in the Unit go virtually unmentioned in his official biography. In 2006, the company attempted to acquire the firm Sourcefire, whose intrusion-prevention technology is used to protect the computer assets of both the Pentagon and NSA. Because of the potential for espionage, the deal set off alarm bells at the NSA and FBI and it was eventually killed by the Committee on Foreign Investments in the U.S., an oversight board.

Alan T. Sherman, a specialist in information assurance at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, noted the potential for “information warfare” was likely. “It’s easy to hide malicious [software] code. Sometimes it just takes a few lines of malicious code to subvert a system.” Nevertheless, despite the fact that many of the NSA’s and the Pentagon’s sensitive
communications—like those of the rest of the country—travel across the tapping equipment of Verint and Narus, their links to Israel seem to have slipped below the radar.