Investigative Due Diligence and Why It Matters?

Regulatory Ramblings

Ep 46 with Daniel Greenberg
Daniel Greenberg is the founder, president, and lead investigator of Greenberg Corporate Intelligence, a Washington, DC-based boutique investigations firm that commenced operations in March 2023. The firm offers research and intelligence services for private-sector clients such as support attorneys, private equity firms, hedge funds, and compliance teams.

Dan has been working in the due diligence and corporate investigations field since 2010. Most recently, he was a managing director at Forward Risk, having previously worked at Kroll, Exiger and TD International.

Beginning in 2018, Dan helped grow Forward Risk from a small, newly established company with a handful of employees to a premier firm with over 25 full-time investigators. Forward Risk was acquired in November 2022, and, after a transition period, Dan left to establish his own independent firm – GCI.

He has a track record of uncovering hard-to-find facts, overcoming difficult challenges, and providing responsive service. His experience has mainly centered on investigative due diligence, shareholder activism support, litigation support, and competitive intelligence.

Dan holds a B.A. in International Affairs from George Washington University and an M.A. in Middle Eastern History from Tel Aviv University. Dan is also Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE #: 869765). Dan is licensed as a Private Detective in the District of Columbia.

The term due diligence is so often overused that in present colloquial vernacular, it is used as a quick, easy, and often lazy shorthand way of describing a plethora of background checks – varying from basic, perfunctory desk research to full blown investigations.

To tackle such misconceptions, Daniel chats with Regulatory Ramblings host Ajay Shamdasani to clarify what “due diligence” actually entails, while describing his own path as an entrepreneur.

Daniel shares his recollections about going to college in the US capital and later pursuing further graduate study - delving into the past of a long-troubled region in Israel.

The conversation goes on to delineate why investigative due diligence is (or should be) of paramount concern to the world’s largest banking and financial institutions and multinational corporations, as well as whether traditional backgrounds such as law enforcement, military service or intelligence work are necessarily the best ways to get into such work in an age when many corporate investigators are ex-journalists or researchers.

Daniel stresses that his firm’s approach to such work is focused on using open sources, public records, and interviews to identify and understand fraudulent behaviour and other risk issue.

The discussion concludes with a reflection on the tragic events following Hamas’ incursion into Israel on October 7, 2023, and Daniel shares his expertise on how, with all the intelligence and technology Israel had at its disposal, even it was taken by surprise.

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Chapters

1. Investigative Due Diligence and Why It Matters? (00:00:00)

2. From International Affairs to Due Diligence: Professional Journey (00:03:09)

3. Mastering Google and AI in Investigative Due Diligence (00:18:27)

4. The Role of Open Source and Public Records in Investigative Due Diligence (00:26:46)

5. Defining Due Diligence: Beyond Background Checks to Comprehensive Accountability (00:31:42)

6. Contextualizing Risks: Distinguishing Red Flags in Due Diligence Investigations (00:39:01)

7. Challenges and Rewards of Starting a Firm in the Investigative Field (00:56:41)

8. The Challenges of Intelligence: Israel-Hamas Conflict (01:06:46)