David A. Ford Named Special Agent in Charge of the FBI’s Springfield Division

Director Robert S. Mueller, III has appointed David A. Ford as the special agent in charge of the Springfield Division. He most recently served as chief of the Cyber Intelligence Section and was the senior executive responsible for organizing and leading the FBI’s analysis and reporting on cyber terrorism, cyber espionage, Internet fraud, intellectual property rights theft, and other high-technology crimes.

Mr. Ford entered on duty as a special agent with the FBI in 1992 and has served in a variety of investigative and management positions. He began his career in South Carolina, where he handled bank fraud, public corruption, and violent crime investigations. He was promoted to supervisory special agent in 1997 and reassigned to FBI Headquarters. In Washington, D.C., Mr. Ford coordinated computer crime investigations, cyber terrorism initiatives, and bank fraud investigations. In 1999, he transferred to Georgia to develop a new computer crime program for the FBI’s office in Atlanta. In addition to supervising a team of cyber crime investigators, he managed a computer forensics laboratory and coordinated a number of infrastructure protection initiatives.

In 2003, Mr. Ford was selected to be the legal attaché at the U.S. Embassy in New Delhi, India. While serving in this position, he managed FBI operations for India, Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, Sri Lanka, and the Maldives. He traveled extensively throughout South Asia and coordinated the FBI’s involvement in several high-profile terrorism investigations. Two years later, Mr. Ford was promoted to the position of assistant special agent in charge in the San Antonio Division. In this role, he managed the counterterrorism, intelligence, surveillance, counterintelligence, and foreign language programs.

He was selected to serve as the legal attaché at the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi, Kenya in 2008. While in this position, he represented the FBI’s interests in Kenya, Somalia, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda, and Burundi. After successfully managing a number of significant terrorism and piracy investigations in East Africa, Mr. Ford was appointed to the Senior Executive Service and reassigned to FBI Headquarters in April 2010.

Mr. Ford is a native of Little Rock, Arkansas. He attended the University of Arkansas and received a Bachelor of Arts degree in international studies in 1981 and a Juris Doctorate degree in 1984. Upon graduation from law school, he served as a U.S. Army lawyer for five years and later practiced law as a trial attorney in Florida for three years.

Mr. Ford has been married for 31 years and has two daughters.