Goodwin Appoints Industry Veteran To Its Newly Created Chief Information Security Officer Role
Goodwin Procter has appointed industry veteran Scott Kopcha as its Chief Information Security Officer (CISO), a newly created role within the firm. In his new role, Kopcha will supervise the whole gamut of the firm’s and its clients’ information security and cybersecurity issues including strategy, architecture, governance, and risk mitigation. Prior to his latest appointment as the CISO, Kopcha served as the firm’s Managing Director of Information Security.
As Goodwin Procter’s CISO, he will oversee security operations, cyber risk and cyber intelligence, regulatory compliance, client counseling, security architecture, data loss and fraud prevention, identity and access management, investigations and forensics, program management, and governance.
Kopcha, who joined Goodwin in 2013, has more than 20 years of experience in information security. He has also received patents for his work with biometric authentication platforms at Janus Associates, where he worked as a Product Manager. Before joining Goodwin, he worked at WilmerHale where he designed and executed industry-leading data and information security programs.
Mark Bettencourt, Goodwin’s Managing Director, said, “As the pace of technological innovation continues to accelerate, information security has come into a sharp focus for our clients, our industry, and our firm, and we are scaling our operations accordingly. Scott is one of the sharpest information security professionals in the industry. His extensive institutional knowledge coupled with his technical skillset will continue to be an invaluable asset to our clients and our firm.”
Commenting on his latest appointment, Kopcha said, “Supporting clients through a rapidly evolving threat environment and regulatory landscape is a top priority for Goodwin. I look forward to working across the firm and with our world-class Data, Privacy & Cybersecurity practice to proactively advance our clients’ and our own security infrastructure and technology.”
Over the last few months, the issues of data breaches and information security have been making headlines in the legal industry. In March, Microsoft warned its customers about a Chinese state-sponsored hacker group “Hafnium” that targets law firms to exfiltrate information. In February, international law firms Jones Day and Goodwin Procter announced data breaches involving third-party vendors. Since then, law firms have been trying to ramp up their information and data security efforts.