FROM THE OFFICE OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS

The Treasury Department today announced the newly-created position of Deputy Assistant Secretary for Critical Infrastructure Protection and Compliance Policy, which will oversee the Office of Critical Infrastructure Protection as part of the Administration’s ongoing effort to strengthen the nation’s safeguards against terrorist activities and financial crime.

Michael A. Dawson, named today as the new Deputy Assistant Secretary for Critical Infrastructure Protection and Compliance Policy, will oversee the Office’s efforts to enforce statutes and regulations within the financial sector, including money laundering, terrorist financing, and identity theft. He will guide the office as it continues to develop and implement policies regarding sharing of information among financial institutions and between the private and public sectors, including security of personal financial information and the sharing of suspicious information under the Bank Secrecy Act.

“The Office of Critical Infrastructure Protection plays a key role in coordinating public and private efforts to protect the critical infrastructure of the financial services industry from attack,” said Wayne A. Abernathy, Assistant Secretary for Financial Institutions. “Deputy Assistant Secretary Dawson will do an outstanding job as we work cooperatively to defend our economy and its institutions in a post-September 11th world.”

The Office of Critical Infrastructure Protection, established after September 11, 2001 under Treasury’s Office of Financial Institutions, also staffs the Financial and Banking Information Infrastructure Committee (FBIIC); assists in developing and promulgating money laundering regulations related to the USA PATRIOT Act; and is currently negotiating with the European Union to obtain a finding that U.S. financial privacy law is “adequate” under the EU’s Data Protection Directive.

Deputy Assistant Secretary Dawson, previously the Senior Advisor to the Deputy Secretary of the Treasury from April 2001 to February 2003, was active in that role in Treasury’s efforts to fight money laundering and terrorist financing.

Prior to joining the Treasury Department, Mr. Dawson served as Chief of Staff at FOLIOfn, a web-based broker-dealer that was the first to allow investors to buy and trade customizable baskets of equities.  Mr. Dawson also worked for the Washington-based law firm, Covington & Burling, and clerked for Judge James L. Oakes on the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. 

Mr. Dawson holds a B.A. in Economics from Williams College, an M. Phil. in Economics from Cambridge University, and a J.D. from the Yale Law School.