Office of the General Counsel

• Jurisdiction: Georgia,United States
• Citation: Vol. 27 No. 1 Pg. 0062
• Pages: 0062
• Publication year: 2021

Office of the General Counsel Vol. 27 No. 1 Pg. 62 Georgia Bar Journal August, 2021

Signed, Sealed, Delivered

BY PAULA FREDERICK

"I only hired your firm because of the cybersecurity precautions you have in place," your client fumes. "I thought my Secret Formula would be safe with you, but now it's swirling around in cyberspace where any hack can find it!"

"We've done everything you asked," you respond. "This firm safeguards client information with the latest technology. We don't have any reason to believe that the Secret Formula is at risk."

"I'll agree you were storing it safely," your client admits. "But why in the world did you send that email with the Formula attached? And from your zmail account, no less!"

"Umm ... I used my zmail account because the file was so large. The office email doesn't allow large attachments. What's wrong with zmail?" you ask. "I use it all the time!"

"Are you kidding?" your client asks. "It's not even encrypted! You could at least have used confidential mode."

"Zmail has a confidential mode?" you wonder.

The Rules of Professional Conduct require lawyers to keep confidential information safely in order to reduce the likelihood that it will be compromised. But how far must a lawyer go to ensure that confidential client information stays confidential?

The answer is clearer now that the Supreme Court of Georgia has approved new comments to the confidentiality rule, Georgia Rule of Professional Conduct 1.6. The Court's Order of May 14, 2021, adds Comments 24 and 25 to help lawyers understand the precautions they must take to prevent confidential information from falling into the wrong hands.

Comment 25...