Association of Corporate Counsel: “More than 40 percent of in-house lawyers stated their companies plan to change data security standards, breach notification procedures, and incident response plans as a result of the upcoming European Union General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), and 63 percent in the United States strongly favor the implementation of a federal law that sets uniform data security and breach notification expectations, according to the Association of Corporate Counsel (ACC) Foundation: The State of Cybersecurity Report. Released by the ACC Foundation, which supports the mission of ACC, and underwritten by Ballard Spahr LLP, the report incorporated data and insights from more than 617 in-house lawyers at over 412 companies in 33 countries.

In-house lawyers anticipate their role in cybersecurity prevention and response, as well as cybersecurity budgets, to increase over the next 12 months. In fact, 63 percent of respondents noted growth in company funds dedicated to cyber incidents, compared to 53 percent in 2015. Chief legal officers (CLO) and general counsel (GC) at large companies are also more likely to serve as members of a data breach response team, compared with those at smaller companies.

“With the rising number of high-profile data breaches and increased focus on technology, it’s no shock to see protection of corporate data become the fastest rising area of concern for legal and business executives,” said Veta T. Richardson, ACC president and CEO. “Data can be a company’s most valuable and most vulnerable resource. Legal departments play an essential role in formulating policies and procedures to mitigate cyber risk.”