As Senior Director of Security Intelligence at McAfee, William P. Woods leads the organization’s Security Fusion Centers worldwide. The centers provide physical security for all McAfee employees, contractors and facilities; network security for all McAfee networks and cyber activities; proactive threat hunting teams; McAfee’s Industrial Security programs; the Insider Threat Program; and Cyber Security Incident Response Teams. He also provides guidance to McAfee’s global security teams who are responsible for protecting people, property, assets and critical data. 

Prior to joining McAfee in 2017, Woods had a career lasting over 22 years as a Special Agent in the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). He finished his career as an FBI Executive responsible for leading the St. Louis, Mo. Field Office, where he spearheaded multiple investigations, while supporting multiple cyber, counter-terrorism, counter-intelligence and criminal investigations. 

With the FBI, he led technical investigations in the Operational Technology Division and was the Chief Security Officer for the Washington, D.C. Field Office. He also spent five years in the Critical Incident Response Group, where he hired, trained, assigned and coordinated special deployments for surveillance teams and worked investigations throughout the U.S. 

According to Woods, a project he is most proud of during his career at the FBI is the large-scale crisis and investigation involving the law enforcement shooting of Michael Brown in 2014, which led to the Ferguson, Mo. unrest, and thus sparked vigorous debate in the U.S. about the relationship between law enforcement officers and African Americans and the use-of-force law in Missouri and nationwide. 

“This investigation was extremely sensitive with highly charged emotions from people with different views on what occurred and why,” Woods notes. “It became a highly publicized investigation with scrutiny up to the White House. Ultimately, I ensured the FBI investigation was thorough and unbiased, following the evidence regardless of the politics.”   

Before joining the FBI, Woods served as an Army National Guard pilot and officer; a former New York State Police - State Trooper; and Company Commander in the U.S. Army Reserve. He is a graduate of the State University of New York at Buffalo. He has been married for over 20 years and has three children.

“Some of the best career advice I have received from mentors and friends, especially as it pertains to leadership in security/investigations, which often demands leadership under stressful circumstances, [is] be tough but kind, be confident but humble,” Woods says. “These may sound contradictory, but they are not. Set high expectations for yourself and your teams and be honest about results. When dealing with people use common sense and common courtesy. My father told me, ‘Treat people with the same courtesy and respect you would want them to show your mother.’”