October 12, 2017

How Law Firms Can Avoid a Costly Data Breach

A surprising two-thirds (66%) of law firms have experienced some sort of data breach, according to the Q1 2017 Law Firm Cyber Security Scorecard from technology consulting company Logicforce.

Legal firms handle a lot of valuable information including financial data, corporate strategies and trade secrets, confidential personal data, and protected health information (PHI).

Most people have heard about the Panama Papers when 11.5 million files were stolen from one of the world’s largest offshore law firms – and these kinds of deep intrusions in a firm’s network continue to be a common risk. According to Logicforce, there are more than 10,000 intrusions per network every day.

But breach incidents also occur due to lost or stolen laptops, ransomware attacks, phishing messages (about 59% of emails sent to legal firms are phishing or spam messages) and loose confidential papers in and out of the law office.

The costs of a security breach include hefty non-compliance fines, lost revenue, and a damaged reputation. The 2016 Cost of Data Breach Study, Global Analysis by Ponemon estimates that the average cost of each compromised record is approximately $221. In 2016, the average cost per breach was $4 million.

Here are information security tips for law firms.

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