California Court Knowingly Exposes Confidential Data for 10 Days

The ABA Journal reports that a court in California's Sacramento County made 443 confidential documents available on a public kiosk. The problem wasn't fixed until June 4 even though a probate lawyer had brought the problem to the attention of the court on May 24. According to Presiding Judge Steve White, court technology employees didn’t act immediately because of another apparently more pressing computer problem.

Read the story here.

Law Firms slow to awaken to cybersecurity threat

National Law Journal: Hackers delve for client secrets, litigation plans, negotiation strategies and details of pending transactions.

An oddly worded e-mail was the first sign of something amiss at Los Angeles firm Gipson Hoffman & Pancione. It didn't read like the messages the firm's attorneys usually sent each other — didn't pass the "smell test." ... His suspicions raised, the recipient, associate Gregory Fayer, picked up the phone and discovered that the colleague who supposedly sent the e-mail knew nothing of it. Other attorneys at the firm also received the bogus e-mail, which was eventually traced to China — where Gipson Hoffman is litigating a $2.2 billion copyright infringement suit against the government. Fayer was well aware that cyberattackers often use fake e-mail messages to break into computer networks.

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Thanks to Dave Roberts and Leba Finklestein for this.