Russia, Former Soviet Republics

Victor G. Budanov

CAREER BIOGRAPHY

Victor received an engineering degree from the Railway University of Novosibirsk and later served 34 years with the State Security Service and the Foreign Intelligence Service of the former Soviet Union and Russia where he specialized in counterintelligence, foreign counterintelligence and anti-terrorism. Victor served several tours abroad before retiring from the service as a Major General in 1992.

In 1992, he co founded and became the first president of the first non-governmental association in Russia for private security and detective firms, the Association of International Cooperation for Business and Personal Security (ABS), which included 56 private companies. In October of 1992, this association held the first international conference in the history of Russia addressing the problems of security for private businesses, which was attended by 70 A.S.I.S. members who made 10 presentations. The next year Victor became the first Russian member of A.S.I.S. In 1994 Victor joined the American Chamber of Commerce as an active and contributing member of its Security Committee.

From 1993 through 1999, Victor joined forces with Gerard Burke to create the Parvus-Jerico Group, which provided risk management services to Western companies operating in Russia and the former Soviet Union.

Since 1999, Victor has directed the network of IRIS - International Risk and Information Services, a risk management holding company with a network of nearly 700 security professionals safeguarding its multinational corporate clients’ interests in Central and Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union performing:

Investigations - Due diligence, background checks, asset identification location and recovery, fraud, theft embezzlement, intellectual property theft, patent and trademark infringement

 

Business Intelligence - Geopolitical and socioeconomic risk assessments, country/regional analysis, competitor intelligence, industrial counterintelligence, security risk analysis, legislative monitoring

 

Protective Services - Executive protection and personal security, security system design and installation, technical surveillance countermeasures, corporate security staffing and training, asset and cargo protection

 

Crisis Prevention and Management - Threat assessments and resolution, crisis management planning and response

AFFILIATIONS

American Society for Industrial Security, 1993

American Chamber of Commerce in Russia, 1994

Russo British Chamber of Commerce, 2003

European Business Club, 2003

International Intelligence Network, 2003

Coalition of Intellectual Property Rights, 2004

 

SPEAKING ENGAGEMENTS

As an expert on intelligence, security, and international affairs, he has been a keynote speaker at international security conferences in Europe, the United States, and the CIS including the following:

A.S.I.S. annual convention (thrice)

Securitas Seminars in Stockholm (twice)

ISMA conference in Minneapolis

International Insurance Conference in Helsinki (twice)

International Conference for Transport and Cargo Safety in Prague

Multiple security conferences in Moscow and St. Petersburg

 

MEDIA

Beginning in 1992, Victor was interviewed on American, British, Russian, Brazilian, Finnish and Swedish television. His partnership with Gerard Burke was featured on CBS television’s Street Stories and 48 Hours, in Forbes magazine, The Washington Post, The International Herald Tribune, Boston Globe, The Washington Business Journal, The European, and The Wall Street Journal, as well as in well-known publications in the U.K., Sweden, Italy, and Russia (We, Kommersant, Trud, Izvestia and Tribune).