Cybersecurity

Law Firms & Cyber Security

Cyber risk is an issue for any organization where client data is collected and is incredibly sensitive. Trade secrets. Client transactions with third parties. The importance of cyber security ranks extremely highly amongst financial institutions, banks and many businesses in general . It is still relatively new to employ a “Chief Digital Officer” or “Chief Information Officer” to have responsibility for oversight of cyber risk but it is on the rise —research firm Gartner predicts 90% of large organisations will have a chief digital officer role by 2019. And the CDO or CIO role is increasingly becoming a core role within a firm’s management.

There have been a number of cyber breaches so far involving law firms, the most well known being attacks against Cravath, Swaine & Moore, Weil Gotshal & Manges, DLA Piper and Mossack Fonseca [the latter being the “Panama Papers” leak].

Law firms are not immune from cyber risk. In fact, they are easier targets — and that is because, broadly speaking, the levels of data security are far lower than other companies and therefore they are easier to access by potential hackers.