Aerojet Rocketdyne has agreed to pay $9 million to resolve allegations raised by a whistleblower that the aerospace and defense manufacturer misled the federal government regarding its compliance with cybersecurity requirements in certain contracts.
The settlement, announced Friday, resolves a lawsuit brought by former Aerojet employee Brian Markus on behalf of the United States under the qui tam provisions of the False Claims Act. For his part, Markus will receive $2.6 million of the recovery.
Aerojet neither admitted nor denied the allegations raised in the lawsuit.
The details: Markus joined Aerojet in June 2014 as senior director of cybersecurity, compliance and controls, according to his complaint filed in September 2017. The company was a provider of propulsion and power systems for the Department of Defense (DOD), NASA, and other federal agencies and therefore required to comply with minimum standards of cybersecurity in certain contracts subject to acquisition regulations.
In his role, Markus discovered the company wasn’t meeting the minimum cybersecurity requirements to be awarded DOD or NASA contracts, according to his complaint. He found Aerojet to be “understaffed and under budgeted” and regarded the state of the company’s computer systems as indication it hadn’t been in compliance with the requirements for years.
When Markus was asked to present to the parent company’s board on Aerojet’s cybersecurity compliance, his report indicating the system was “...
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