A very interesting update on a recent U.S Supreme Court Ruling ‘whether and to what extent does a defendant€™s subjective understanding or beliefs€¦

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A very interesting update on a recent U.S Supreme Court Ruling

‘whether and to what extent does a defendant€„¢s subjective understanding or beliefs about the lawfulness of its conduct establish €œknowledge€ sufficient to impose FCA liability’

If correct and one is not a lawyer. It appears to make clear that when a claim is made by a contractors under contract to Federal Government the contractor knew that that the claim was false at the time the claim was made. Whether when a claim is made the ‘contractor believed a claim was unlawful or was aware of a substantial risk of unlawfulness’

Does this raise questions for defense contractors under DFARS 252.204-7012, 7019 and 7020 where contractors and subcontractors are required to attest their compliance to the NIST SP 800-171 cybersecurity standard. A standard that the U.S GAO has said in several reports is not being complied to by companies in the DIB.

The DoJ put in place it’s Civil cyber Fraud initiative in 2021, making reference to Federal Contractor cyber compliance and the FCA back then. One wonders the next steps in this story as the DIB is not complying to NIST 171, cyber is a national security issue, as is the manufacture of defense weapon systems.

B. Stephanie Siegmann Ted Dziekanowski Rachel V. Rose, JD, MBA

#cybersecurity #defenseindustry #defense #dfars

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