Jill D. Rhodes - The ABA Cybersecurity Handbook. A Resource for Attorneys, Law Firms, and Business Professionals

President, American Bar Association

The American Bar Association recognizes that cybersecurity is one of the most important challenges facing our economy and nation. To examine cybersecurity from both the legal business and national security perspectives, the ABA created the Cybersecurity Legal Task Force. The association asked the Task Force to address the tough questions about the appropriate role and responsibility of lawyers in cyber-related incidents and to examine ways that lawyers and businesses can protect their practices and their clients confidential information and intellectual property.

The Task Force is proud to release the ABA Cybersecurity Handbook . The handbook is a powerful and effective tool that attorneys, law firms, in-house counsel and business professionals should utilize in understanding, planning for and responding to a cyber breach.

Thank you to the members from various sections and committeesincluding Administrative Law, Business Law, Criminal Justice, Disaster Response and Preparedness, Environment, Energy and Resources, Individual Rights and Responsibilities, International Law, Law and National Security, Law Practice Management, Litigation, Professional Responsibility, Public Utility, Communications and Transportation Law, Science and Technology Law, State and Local Government Law, Technology and Information Systems, and Tort, Trial and Insurance Practiceand the advisory team of corporate general counsel and security experts from private industry who volunteered to serve on the Task Force. I am especially grateful to Judith Miller and Harvey Rishikof for their leadership and vision.

On behalf of the entire American Bar Association, I extend our sincere appreciation to Jill Rhodes, Vince Polley and their team for their dedication, creativity and discipline in articulating the questions requiring a response and developing this handbook.

As the national voice of the legal profession, the ABA has a professional obligation to help lawyers understand and defend against cyber threats while meeting new ethical obligations. Our world will only become more reliant on technology and the Internet as we move farther into the Digital Age. I am confident that the ABA Cybersecurity Handbook will be an invaluable resource for years to come.

Cyberspace has become the new domain of intense social, legal and political interest. But the cyber domain has come with threats and vulnerabilitiescybercrime, cyber espionage and cyber war. Each of these presents legal challenges appropriate for American Bar Association analysis, evaluation and discussionin an effort to help lawyers and clients in both the private and public sectors grapple with some of these issues and assist when possible in their resolution, this ABA Cybersecurity Handbook is being offered.

The ABA, under President Laurel Bellows leadership, created a Cybersecurity Legal Task Force in 2012. The Task Force is composed of representatives of all ABA entities having an interest in the cyber domain. The Task Force is guided by four goals: provide organizational cohesion and a platform for the work being done and to be done by the ABA; raise awareness of these issues in specific lawyer and client settings; ensure real involvement across the legal and technical communities; and finally, craft solutions to the strategic challenges the Task Forces work identifies, including best practices, operational solutions, and legal and policy recommendations. The ABA Cybersecurity Legal Task Force has and will bring together and highlight resources within the ABA to focus and coordinate the ABAs input into analysis of proposals on cybersecurity. Our activities have and will include:

1. Facilitating collaboration and information exchange among constituent ABA entities and with relevant public agencies and private organizations;
2. Serving as a clearinghouse among ABA entities, regarding cybersecurity activities, policy proposals, advocacy, publications and resources;