Tips for Mobile App Privacy Compliance
Safeguards against Data Security Breaches (Part Two)
Safeguards against Data Security Breaches (Part One)
For more than four decades, Fenwick & West has helped some of the world’s most recognized companies become, and remain, market leaders. From emerging enterprises to large public corporations, our clients are leaders in the technology, life sciences and cleantech sectors and are fundamentally changing the world through rapid innovation.
Fenwick & West was founded in 1972 in the heart of Silicon Valley—before “Silicon Valley” existed—by four visionary lawyers who left a top-tier New York law firm to pursue their shared belief that technology would revolutionize the business world and to pioneer the legal work for those technological innovations. In order to be most effective, they decided they needed to move to a location close to primary research and technology development. These four attorneys opened their first office in downtown Palo Alto, and Fenwick became one of the first technology law firms in the world.
From our founding in 1972, Fenwick has been committed to promoting diversity and inclusion both within our firm and throughout the legal profession. For almost four decades, the firm has actively promoted an open and inclusive work environment and committed significant resources towards improving our diversity efforts at every level.
At Fenwick, we are proud of our commitment to the community and to our culture of making a difference in the lives of individuals and organizations in the communities where we live and work. We recognize that providing legal services is not only an essential part of our professional responsibility, but also an excellent opportunity for our attorneys to gain valuable practical experience, learn new areas of the law and contribute to the community.
Year after year, Fenwick & West is honored for excellence in the legal profession. Many of our attorneys are recognized as leaders in their respective fields, and our Corporate, Tax, Litigation and Intellectual Property Practice Groups consistently receive top national and international rankings, including:
- Nearly 15 percent of Fenwick partners named America's Leading Lawyers for Business by Chambers USA and Chambers Global
- Selected as a "Go-To" law firm by in-house legal departments at Fortune 500 companies in Corporate Counsel magazine
- Named to The National Law Journal's inaugural "Intellectual Property Hot List" for outstanding patent, copyright, trademark and IP litigation services
We take sustainability very seriously at Fenwick. Like many of our clients, we are adopting policies that reduce consumption and waste, and improve efficiency. By using technologies developed by a number of our cleantech clients, we are at the forefront of implementing sustainable policies and practices that minimize environmental impact. In fact, Fenwick has earned recognition in several areas as one of the top US law firms for implementing sustainable business practices.
Read more about our commitment to sustainability and cleantech
At Fenwick, we have a passion for excellence and innovation that mirrors our client base. Our firm is making revolutionary changes to the practice of law through substantial investments in proprietary technology tools and processes—allowing us to deliver best-in-class legal services more effectively.
Mountain View Office
Silicon Valley Center
801 California Street
Mountain View, CA 94041
650.988.8500
San Francisco Office
555 California Street
12th Floor
San Francisco, CA 94104
415.875.2300
Seattle Office
1191 Second Avenue
10th Floor
Seattle, WA 98101
206.389.4510
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Advanced Security and Risk Management
Dealing with top-secret transactions and inventions on a daily basis means we have to take security seriously. At Fenwick, we go to great lengths to ensure that our clients’ data is private and secure. With input from some of the world’s top security experts, we have designed and implemented sophisticated systems to mitigate security risks, and developed formal policies and protocols to safeguard our clients’ data around the world.
Because data security is so critical to how we conduct business, our internal security team reports directly to the firm’s senior management and is accountable to outside data security auditors. Our data security system includes:
- Software packages on all firm computers that are customized to provide real time automated firewall, anti-spam and anti-virus protection
- Stringent security and data recovery standards for any personal and mobile technology used by lawyers or staff
- A trained network security officer on staff
- A state-of-the art, continuously monitored computer data center with 24-hour on-site security
- Real-time failover for our redundant connections to the Internet. Data links with clients are unlikely to ever fail and are tested every six months
- Constant monitoring of all servers and network equipment with an intrusion detection system, including a vulnerability assessment/scanning appliance and host-based intrusion prevention agents, six layers of virus protection and two layers of anti-spam protection
Fenwick’s Approach to Keeping Data Secure
Comprehensive and global protection
Our systems and controls cover our physical and virtual handling of confidential client information, including records management, electronic communications, forensic data collection and analysis, IT data handling, and IT physical and virtual security. We have also designed specific protocols for our work in geographic regions around the world where security issues carry greater risk and unpredictability.
A focus on business continuity and disaster recovery planning
Our formal business continuity and network security plans cover normal operating parameters as well as emergency response procedures. We conduct regular drills on our business continuity plan and, twice a week, meetings are held between security officers and network support staff to review security procedures, patch status and security protocols for all computers on the firm’s network. Twice a year we review our network security plan with a national expert on network security who has handled security audits for the U.S. Congress and is one of the very few quadruple Cisco Certified Information Experts (CCIE) in the world.
Our data continuity protocols also feature the following:
- All users are trained to keep firm data on server-based systems so client information is captured and maintained through our multi-layer back-up system
- We have Service Level Agreements (SLAs) that provide for no more than a minimal number of hours of data entry loss in the event of a disaster
- All business critical data is simultaneously stored in two different physical locations with multiple levels of backup at a secure, managed, off-site data storage facility
- We have continuous data backup to an offsite facility--used by some of the largest high-tech companies in the world—which means firm data and client information is available via VPN in the event of a disaster
A nationally recognized team of IT professionals
We have invested heavily in technology to protect our clients’ information and have assembled a team of IT professionals that are not only leaders among law firms, but leaders in their field. Members of our IT staff are regular speakers at national and international security and records management conferences, and the firm and our IT staff have won numerous awards for their innovative approach to IT infrastructure.
Take Action
Our Data Security team meets regularly with our clients’ legal and IT teams to ensure best practices in data security. Contact Matt Kesner at (650) 428-4488 or mkesner@fenwick.com. to learn how we can help ensure your data is secure, wherever it resides.
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