A new national Special Interest Group (SIG) has been formed to support the legal industry called the National Legal Industry Special Interest Group. Its purpose is to organize communication, education and sharing of threat information to all active InfraGard members. Our demographic needs to extend beyond the current critical infrastructure hierarchy in that our firms often represent multiple sectors, so it’s common for a firm to be simultaneously engaged with clients in various sectors. We may be doing M&A work for a global organization, while doing government contract work, while helping build our next nuclear power plant, while suing China over intellectual property theft, etc. Our users typically travel globally and many are unaware of the threats that exist while visiting some nation states. Without the ability to organize and share information specific to the practice areas that firms represent, there will always be targeted attacks that compromise our nation’s secrets and intellectual capital. In addition to firms, our demographics extend to all corporate legal departments and our court systems. Our target demographic is the general counsel or related individual in charge of risk for their organizations, as well as managing partners of firms and individuals who work in the legal field and our court systems.

In addition, it will be our responsibility to work with other organizations within the industry like the ABA, ILTA and insurance providers to help support their educational programs for cybersecurity.

We will begin a member drive to add current InfraGard members who match our demographic as well as bring new members to our SIG.

We have organized nationally and have a structure in place now to support all InfraGard regions per the org structure above.

Andy Jurczyk is the National Chair of the Legal Industry SIG, he resides in Chicago and has worked closely with the Chicago FBI office and InfraGard chapter to organize and build the SIG. He is the Chief Information Officer at Seyfarth Shaw LLP.

Eric Anderson is the National Finance Chair, responsible for managing all financial transactions necessary for the SIG.

Steve Skidmore will serve as Chairman for the Northeast Region. Steve is the IT Director for Martin Clearwater & Bell LLP, a litigation firm based in New York City. Steve also serves as the Firm’s HIPAA/HITECH Security Officer, where he coordinates with healthcare systems on data security to ensure the privacy of EMR and PHI.

Tim Armstrong is the Chief Operating Officer for Vinson & Elkins L.L.P., an AMLAW 50 law firm headquartered in Houston, Texas, where he has held a number of positions over the last 24 years, including the roles of Chief Financial Officer and Chief Information Officer.

Rick Lutkus is a Partner in the San Francisco office of Seyfarth Shaw LLP. He is the only attorney in the world who holds deeply technical certifications in digital forensics (EnCE), eDiscovery (EnCEP), and information security (CEH). Mr. Lutkus’ exceptionally strong technical background includes experience in information security, computer programming, computer and mobile device forensics, and eDiscovery.

Dan Nottke is currently the Chief Information Officer for Kirkland & Ellis LLP, a 100 year old law firm where he has led the transformation of the Information Technology department from a decentralized team to a fully centralized Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL)-based, high-performing organization. Dan was named “CIO of the Year” at Legaltech News’ 2015 Innovation Awards, held in San Francisco in July 2015.

Please look for educational programs in your region and join our SIG!