ICE HSI efforts to combat COVID fraud featured on NBC Today Show, ABC Good Morning America

WASHINGTON – Efforts to combat COVID-19 fraud by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) have been featured on NBC’s Today Show and ABC’s Good Morning America in recent months.

On Friday July 17, Good Morning America aired a segment on counterfeit 3M N95 masks, featuring HSI-led Intellectual Property Rights Center (IPR Center) Special Agent Julie Hilario and ICE Deputy Director and Senior Official Performing the Duties of the Director Matthew Albence, profiling an HSI New York case where a New York City pharmacist was charged with hoarding and price gouging N95 masks.

In June, the Today Show featured HSI New York Acting Deputy Special Agent in Charge Erik Rosenblatt at the John F Kennedy Airport mail facility in New York City, in a segment about how ICE and U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) are working together to prevent COVID-19 fraud and stop unauthorized and counterfeit products from getting to U.S. consumers. The story aired June 9.

HSI launched a special operation – called Operation Stolen Promise – in April 2020 to protect U.S. consumers from the increasing and evolving threat posed by the pandemic. The operation involves various federal agencies, including CBP, the U.S. Department of Justice, U.S. Postal Inspection Service, U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the Internal Revenue Service, and private sector partners, including Pfizer, 3M, Amazon and others.

Operation Stolen Promise combines HSI’s expertise in global trade, financial fraud, international operations and cybercrime to investigate financial fraud schemes, the importation of prohibited pharmaceuticals and medical supplies, websites defrauding consumers, and any other illicit criminal activities associated with the virus that compromise legitimate trade or financial systems or endangers the public.

For more information or to report COVID fraud, visit the Operation Stolen Promise website.