Partner B. Stephanie Siegmann, co-chair of the Cybersecurity, Privacy & Data Protection group, spoke with Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly regarding the federal judiciary’s recent announcement that it is starting to bolster the security of online dockets in response to cyberattacks.
Stephanie, who was serving as national security chief at the time of the first breach on PACER, which occurred in late 2020 as a result of the SolarWinds Cyberattack, notes that even at that time, there were concerns that the PACER system was outdated.
Given this, she says that updating the security of the federal courts’ current online docket system needs to be a “top priority” for the country.
“It is not acceptable for foreign governments to be able to breach [the system] and we know they’ve been doing it since at least 2020. This is the backbone of our federal judicial system,” she says. “It needs to work; it needs to be secure…”
