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The Role of Encryption in Law Firm Data Security

By David Greetham and David Levine
August 01, 2017

Incidents over the last few years leave little doubt that hackers are increasingly targeting law firms. The data breach of law firm Mossack Fonesca, known as the Panama Papers, last April was the largest known and highest profile. The thieves took 2.6 terabytes of data, including 2.2 million PDFs, 3 million database files and 4.8 million emails. (For more on the Panama Papers, see, “The 'Panama Papers' and You,” a two-part article in our sibling LJN newsletter, Business Crimes Bulletin.)

Yet, many law firms don't use even basic encryption. In the ABA's 2016 Legal Technology Survey, only 38% of respondents reported using file encryption, only 26% use email encryption for confidential or privileged communications and documents sent to their clients, and only 15% use drive encryption.

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