Leaver

The subject departs the organization due to the planned or unplanned end of a temporary engagement  (typically as a contractor, consultant, vendor, or contingent worker). These non-renewals may lack the emotional intensity of involuntary terminations but introduce distinct insider threat risks tied to access posture, entitlement hygiene, and perceived ownership of deliverables.

Unlike full-time employees, contract-based personnel are frequently managed outside standard HR and identity governance systems. As a result, they often fall outside formal offboarding processes - retaining access to internal systems, repositories, or communication channels due to limited integration with core IT asset and access management workflows.

Separation timelines are commonly informal, unstructured, or delayed - particularly when procurement, business units, and security functions operate in silos. If the subject disagrees with the decision not to renew, or views their contributions as personally owned, data loss or intellectual property exfiltration may occur as a form of leverage or to support future portfolio use.

Investigators should recognize that contract-based relationships introduce a structurally distinct insider risk profile, particularly at time of exit. These subjects may exploit offboarding blind spots, reuse credentials, or transfer sensitive materials under the belief that they are exempt from internal policy enforcement. This hubris, combined with reduced visibility and limited organizational recourse, can enable undetected or unchallenged infringement.

The subject initiates their voluntary departure from the organization, typically through formal resignation. While not inherently malicious, resignation marks a critical inflection point, particularly when paired with future employment at a competitor, ongoing interpersonal conflict, or dissatisfaction with organizational direction.

Subjects who resign may experience a shift in loyalty, a reduced sense of accountability, a weakened sense of confidentiality, or surface a previously held belief that organizational data is now personally justifiable to retain. These attitudes may lead to pre-exit infringement such as covert (or overt) data transfers to personal systems or accounts.

In many cases, resignation can introduce a false sense of finality or detachment, wherein the subject no longer adheres to internal policy boundaries. Risk is elevated during the notice period, especially in environments with weak offboarding processes.

The subject departs the organization due to permanent withdrawal from the workforce (commonly through retirement, long-term medical leave, or other non-return scenarios). These exits are typically low-conflict and pre-announced, leading many organizations to deprioritize insider threat risk during the transition. However, this assumption can obscure several operational realities.

Retiring subjects (particularly long-tenured employees) often retain extensive institutional knowledge, broad access privileges, and deep familiarity with unmonitored systems or legacy processes. Emotional drivers such as nostalgia, ownership over work product, or a desire to “preserve” professional contributions may lead to data exfiltration, sometimes unconcealed or rationalized as harmless.

These behaviors are not necessarily malicious, but they still represent infringements, particularly when proprietary data, customer records, or sensitive infrastructure documentation is copied to personal devices or cloud accounts. Investigators should be attentive to the informal norms that often surround retirements, which may suppress scrutiny or allow boundary-stretching.

The subject is involuntarily removed from the organization due to misconduct, performance failure, policy breach, or other cause-based grounds. Unlike workforce reductions (which typically involves a process and/or negotiation) terminations for cause are highly personal and often carry significant emotional charge, especially if the subject perceives the action as unjust, humiliating, or damaging to reputation or career prospects.

Subjects terminated for cause may exhibit high-risk behaviors during the pre-termination window (e.g., after being placed under investigation or on performance review) or immediately following notification. Even brief access persistence post-notification can present significant risk. The subject may attempt to delete evidence, exfiltrate data for leverage, disrupt systems, or stage retaliatory actions. The motivational blend of perceived injustice and loss of control often drives urgent, overt behavior with little regard for concealment.

Investigators should assess not only the subject’s final actions, but also the timeline of organizational awareness, specifically whether the subject had foreknowledge of the impending termination, and whether access controls were applied in parallel with disciplinary measures.

The subject is affected by an involuntary organizational decision to reduce headcount, commonly referred to as a workforce reduction, layoff, or redundancy. Unlike terminations for other reasons, workforce reduction typically affects multiple employees at once and is driven by budget constraints, restructuring, or strategic realignment.

A subject affected by workforce reduction may experience acute emotional responses (particularly resentment, betrayal, or perceived devaluation) which can develop into retaliatory or self-serving behaviors. These emotional states, when combined with continued access to internal systems, can motivate infringements.

Subjects impacted by workforce reductions may engage in infringements during the period between notification and final termination. When the workforce reduction is publicly known, subjects may further rationalize inappropriate actions as justified by circumstance or organizational failure. Investigators should consider the timing of the reduction announcement, the subject’s level of access, and any prior indicators of behavioral drift, before and during the offboarding window. Elevated risk is especially present where access revocation is delayed beyond a few hours after notification.