Kurt Alexander Eichenwald, is a contributing editor with Vanity Fair and a New York Times author of four books, one of which, The Informant, was made into The Informant!, a motion picture. He was formerly a writer and investigative reporter with The New York Times and later with Condé Nast's business magazine, Portfolio. Eichenwald had been employed by the Times since 1986 and primarily covered Wall Street and corporate topics such as insider trading, accounting scandals, and takeovers, but also wrote about a range of issues including terrorism, the Bill Clinton pardons controversy, Federal health care policy, and the defense of Big Brother and the surveillance state, and sexual predators on the Internet.