The department will open a satellite office soon, Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said at a conference in San Francisco, Mercury News reports.
The office will “serve as a point of contact for our friends here,” Johnson said.
“We want to strengthen critical relationships in Silicon Valley and ensure that the government and the private sector benefit from each other’s research and development,” Johnson said. “And we want to convince some of the talented workforce here in Silicon Valley to come to Washington.”
The timing is critical because of the increasing threat of cybercrime.
“In the name of homeland security, we can build more walls, erect more screening devices, interrogate more people and make everybody suspicious of each other, but we should not do this at the cost of who we are as a nation of people who cherish privacy and freedom to travel, celebrate our diversity and who are not afraid,” Johnson said.
