- Former Accenture employee indicted by Department of Justice
- The employee is accused of misrepresenting security measures to obtain and retain government contracts.
- Accenture did not follow FedRamp, but agencies were led to believe that it did
The US Department of Justice has confirmed that Hilmer, a former product manager at Accenture, is accused of lying to government customers about the security measures of cloud products.
According to the Department of Justice, Accenture’s cloud platform did not meet security oversight requirements, but the defendant lied to potential customers to hide security issues and encouraged others to do the same.
Accenture failed to comply with the Federal Risk Management and Authorization Program (FedRAMP), the framework used by federal agencies to ensure the evaluation, authorization and ongoing monitoring of cloud products and services.
false claim
The former employee is also accused of submitting documents containing false information to obtain and complete government contracts. According to LastHilmer “made false and misleading statements to the US military in an attempt to induce them to sponsor the platform for preliminary approval by the Department of Defense.”
“Hillmer is charged with two counts of bank fraud, one count of aggravated government fraud and two counts of obstructing a federal audit.” If convicted, Hillmer faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison on the wire fraud charge, a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison on the aggravated state fraud charge and a maximum sentence of five years in prison on each charge of obstructing a federal audit.
SecurityWeek contacted Accenture and a spokesperson released the following statement:
“As previously stated in our public filings, we proactively reported this matter to the government following an internal review. We have cooperated extensively with the government’s investigation and will continue to do so. We continue to operate with the highest ethical standards while serving all of our customers, including the federal government.”