New York has recently enacted a new anti-SLAPP (strategic lawsuits against public participation) statute, which provides additional remedies for the defense of frivolous lawsuits brought to deter the exercise of free speech and public petition rights. N.Y. Civil Right Law, §76-a(1)(a) now defines an “action involving public petition and participation” (i.e. a SLAPP action) broadly

Several weeks into the coronavirus pandemic, New York businesses remain subject to the provisions of Executive Order No. 202.8, which required all employers to reduce their in-person workforces at any work locations by 100% starting on March 22. An exception to this restriction applies to “Any essential business or entity providing essential services or functions,”

In recent days, the State of New York has instituted a number of emergency measures affecting business professionals.

All employers in New York State providing non-essential services have been directed to reduce their in-person workforce by 100% no later than March 22 at 8 p.m. This order will likely require many business professionals to transition

The coronavirus pandemic is creating challenges for all sectors of the economy, including for various business professionals. While some steps have been taken to mitigate immediate concerns, professionals must remain aware of their obligations and be mindful of potential pitfalls in this uncertain environment.

For example, the legal profession, which typically relies on in-person appearances,

In a recently issued report, titled “Kill Switch: Why Connected Cars Can Be Killing Machines and How to Turn Them Off,” Consumer Watchdog, a nonprofit consumer advocacy organization, warned that millions of internet-connected cars already on the roadways may be dangerously vulnerable to hacking. While fully autonomous self-driving vehicles may be years away from widespread

This past week, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) voted to approve a record-breaking $5 billion settlement with Facebook, resolving its investigation into the charge that the company violated a prior settlement with the Commission when it improperly permitted political data firm Cambridge Analytica to access 87 million users’ personal information.

Cambridge Analytica created personality quiz

On February 29, 2019, the Federal Trade Commission announced that the video social networking app Musical.ly, now known as TikTok, agreed to pay $5.7 million to settle a claim that the company illegally collected personal information from children, the largest such civil penalty to date.

The Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) requires websites and

The California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), which passed in 2018 and goes into effect January 1, 2020, is intended to provide some of the most rigorous privacy protections to California residents but is not limited in application to California companies.

What entities fall under the CCPA?

The CCPA applies to ”businesses” that are for-profit entities

The partial government shutdown, now the longest in U.S. history stretching into its fourth week, presents new risks to cybersecurity, both short term and long term. These effects will be felt not only within government operations, but also in the private sector, which relies upon and works with the government to protect against cyber threats.

The American Bar Association’s Standing Committee on Ethics and Professional Responsibility recently issued a Formal Opinion, providing updated recommendations regarding lawyers’ obligations when using technology resources to communicate with clients and to protect confidential client information.

Since 1999, the Committee has advised that the ABA Model Rules of Professional Conduct permit an attorney to transmit

The Democrats in the Pennsylvania State Senate recently fell victim to a ransomware attack that locked lawmakers and their staffs out of their computer, data, email and website. Hackers were able to infect the party’s network with malware and demanded a ransom payment in bitcoin in order to remove the virus and unlock the files.

In a recent decision, the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York considered whether principles of judicial estoppel may prevent an assignee of a legal malpractice claim from prevailing on a claim against his former adversary’s attorneys. Molina v. Faust Goetz Schenker & Blee, LLP, 2017 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 13568 (S.D.N.Y.

Employers regularly collect and maintain confidential personal information about their employees, including birth dates, social security numbers, addresses, tax information, and bank information.  A data breach may put this employee information at risk.  In two recent decisions, courts have had to consider the scope of employers’ duties to their employees to protect confidential personal information

The Federal Trade Commission recently issued a new guidance for businesses on responding to a data breach. The guidance, which is also available in video format on the FTC’s website here, sets forth the concrete steps that any business should take in the event that personal information has been hacked, stolen, or inadvertently exposed.

The

Avigael C. Fyman’s article entitled “Changes in Legal Malpractice Claims Profile Reflects a Stabilizing Economy” has been published in the ABA/BNA Lawyer’s Manual on Professional Conduct.

To read the complete article, Click Here.

Avigael Fyman, a member of the Directors & Officers and Professional Liability Practice Groups, was a contributor to Recent Developments Affecting Professionals’, Directors’, and Officers’ Liability, which has been published in the Winter 2016 issue of the American Bar Association Tort Trial & Insurance Practice Law Journal.

Click here to read the Article.

Russo v. Rozenholc, 2015 N.Y. App. DIV LEXIS 5885, 2015 NY Slip Op 06029 (N.Y. App. Div. July 9, 2015)

While New York law generally requires privity between a client and attorney in order to assert a claim for legal malpractice, in Schneider v. Finmann, 15 N.Y.3d 306, 907 N.Y.S.2d 119 (2010), the New York

The assertion of a breach of contract claim against an attorney for excessive billing does not result in the waiver of the attorney-client privilege as to successor counsel

Waiver of the attorney-client privilege often arises in attorney-client disputes, where “the defendant asserts a claim that in fairness requires examination of protected communications… [t]he key to

Generally, the law in New York is that “a determination fixing a defendant’s fees in a prior action brought by the defendant against the plaintiff for fees for the same legal services which the plaintiff alleges were negligently performed, necessarily determines that there was no legal malpractice.” Breslin Realty Development Corp. v. Shaw, 72 A.D.3d

Traditionally in New York, law guardians appointed in custody disputes were often viewed as taking on a role similar to that of a guardian ad litem, advocating for what they believed to be the best interests of the child, rather than advocating for the outcome desired by the child. Because these law guardians were often

In legal malpractice actions, in order to establish entitlement to relief plaintiffs are generally required to demonstrate that their attorneys were negligent?that is, that they breached their duty of care. While no expert evidence is required to show that the attorney breached his or her duty of care where the “ordinary experience of the fact

While a party who agrees to dismiss an appeal pursuant to a settlement agreement may, under some circumstances, be precluded from pursuing a legal malpractice claim against

Taylor v. Harbour Pointe Homeowners Association, 2012 U.S. App. LEXIS 16216 (2d Cir. Aug. 2, 2012)

While attorneys’ fees are more regularly awarded to prevailing plaintiffs under various federal anti-discrimination statutes, prevailing defendants in such cases are not typically awarded attorneys’ fees unless they can demonstrate that the plaintiff’s claims were “frivolous, unreasonable, or groundless,