Financial safety

What's a Former CIA Lawyer Doing in Crypto?

Russell Bruemmer is taking it upon himself to help token issuers construct compliant initial coin offerings (ICOs).

While that might sound challenging in a space where the regulatory framework has not been formalized, Bruemmer is as prepared as anyone could be in his new role advising blockchain startup Applied Philosophy Labs (APL).

A former top lawyer of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the former lead of the congressional affairs unit at the FBI, Bruemmer gained the relevant experience working for decades at for the law firm of WilmerHale, helping traditional companies structure their corporate governance.

In recent years, he said, he was approached by a number of blockchain entrepreneurs trying to figure out if the token they wanted to issue was a security or not.

As a result, by the time he retired from the firm in 2015, he had laid the foundation for his work advising startups more broadly.