Friend MTS Appoints Dave Gilmore

Friend MTS has expanded its business intelligence services with a new team headed by former KPMG anti-piracy expert, Dave Gilmore, who will become its new VP of Intelligence.

The creation of this role reflects growing demand from content owners and broadcasters to use data insights to better understand piracy trends in order to optimise their anti-piracy strategies, protect content more effectively and safeguard revenue.

Dave will spearhead a new team of data, cyber and intelligence analysts. This team will enhance FMTS' ability to identify and detect the human sources of unauthorised restreaming and service theft by gathering and unpacking extensive data sets, analysing patterns and leveraging those insights for preventive, predictive and forensic purposes. This includes finding vulnerabilities and emerging threats as well as providing actionable intelligence to mitigate those risks. The team will also collaborate closely with law enforcement and independent industry bodies to strengthen enforcement efforts and drive industry-wide initiatives.

Prior to joining FMTS, Dave was Associate Director in Cyber Consulting at KPMG, specialising in cyber investigations, digital trust, brand protection and insider threats. He has two decades of international experience including as a member of Europol’s IP Crime Experts Network and at Ireland’s Garda National Bureau of Criminal Investigation.

Dave's expertise includes conducting investigations across serious and organised crime, Intellectual Property (trademark, design and piracy), fraud, cyber and corruption offences. He investigated the largest seizure of counterfeit electronics in Ireland and secured Ireland’s first conviction for illicit streaming piracy.

Most recently, Dave led anti-piracy cyber threat intelligence teams and brand protection teams conducting investigations on behalf of major sports rights holders, broadcasters and content providers and led a brand protection team during the FIFA 2022 World Cup. During the four years that Dave was the co-lead for Europol's Operation Aphrodite the operation finalised 67 piracy investigations in Ireland, with several court convictions recorded for piracy related offences.

Shane McCarthy, Friend MTS CEO, commented: "As content owners increasingly expect to underpin decisions about their anti-piracy strategies with data and insights, we are building a new team under Dave Gilmore’s leadership to meet this growing demand. Dave’s breadth of experience is second to none and his skillset is the perfect complement to our business intelligence professionals."

Gilmore said: "FMTS offers content owners a formidable combination of human intelligence, cyber capabilities, monitoring and its piracy database. Together, these give the company unparalleled insights into the sources and methods behind global piracy. I look forward to building on its existing business intelligence capabilities and capitalising on new business opportunities with new, innovative service offerings."

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