Ride the Lightning

Survey: General Counsels Too Busy With COVID-19 to Focus on Cybersecurity

April 6, 2020

Law.com (sub.req.) reported on April 3 the results of the COVID-19 Impact Survey by Morrison & Foerster.

Not a surprise, but of the 110 in-house leaders at global companies who took part in the survey, only 29% cited data security as being a major risk, while just 18% said privacy was among their top priorities.

Perfectly understandable, but lamentable. While they are focused on employment issues, contracts and broken supply chains, general counsels are naturally paying less attention to cybersecurity. And that's a great boon to cybercriminals.

"That wasn't a surprise because there's so much going on that's front of mind. But it's definitely something that we try to highlight for clients as a risk," David Newman, a partner at MoFo in Washington, D.C., said in an interview. He heads the firm's coronavirus task force of more than 60 lawyers.

"As difficult as things are now, it will be even more challenging if they have a major data breach," Newman added.

I am impressed that they have a coronavirus task force of more than 60 lawyers!

The survey was conducted between March 20 and March 24 and involved firms in a number of industries, including finance and insurance, technology and manufacturing.

More than 85% of the participating GCs listed labor law issues as their top legal risk, followed by contract-related issues and supply chain disruptions.

Corporate counsel are occupied with poring over contracts and analyzing force majeure provisions, deciphering leave and sick pay policies and studying employer guidelines for potential layoffs, all while they are dealing with making corporate law departments function with remote employees.

Almost 65% of the survey respondents said their biggest challenge was being asked to provide advice on unprecedented issues. The second-biggest challenge? About 55% said it was "making decisions in an uncertain environment."

"It's almost impossible in these times for companies to be fully in accord with their contracts, their privacy obligations, their labor law obligations," Newman said.

The survey results make logical sense – but those results may put businesses at greater risk of a successful cyber-attack.

Sharon D. Nelson, Esq., President, Sensei Enterprises, Inc.
3975 University Drive, Suite 225|Fairfax, VA 22030
Email: Phone: 703-359-0700
Digital Forensics/Cybersecurity/Information Technology
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