Linklaters has announced the hire of Erez Liebermann as partner and Andrew S. Pak as Counsel in its new U.S. data solutions, cyber and privacy practice in New York.

Liebermann is a widely respected cybersecurity and data privacy lawyer. As a federal prosecutor at the U.S. Department of Justice, Liebermann built a team that prosecuted some of the most infamous cyber attacks including the largest credit card data breaches to date, the hack into the newswire agencies to gain insider trading information, national security breaches, and insider logic bombs. During his decade with the DOJ, he served as deputy chief of the criminal division at the U.S. Attorney’s Office, District of New Jersey, overseeing all white collar crimes, and chief of the computer hacking and intellectual property section.

Liebermann joins from Prudential Financial where he was chief counsel, cybersecurity and privacy. There, he built one of the first global cybersecurity and privacy legal teams in the financial services sector as well as a global cyber investigations team conducting incident response, threat intelligence, hunting, e-discovery and insider threat analytics. In 2020, he was appointed to the New York State Cyber Security Advisory Board by Governor Andrew Cuomo.

He will be joined by Andrew S. Pak, who has been appointed as counsel within the U.S. data solutions, cyber and privacy practice. Pak has specialized in cybersecurity for over a decade as a prosecutor, litigator and in-house attorney.

While at the U.S. Department of Justice, Pak led and coordinated the Department’s national litigation strategy against email providers in response to a significant Second Circuit decision impacting law enforcement’s ability to obtain foreign-stored data pursuant to email search warrants. Pak also prosecutedthe hackers in a first-of-its-kind scheme where they infiltrated three newswire services and stole embargoed press releases and sold the material non-public information to securities traders who generate millions in illegal trading profits. He also prosecuted the largest credit card hacking case charged to date, US v. Vladimir Drinkman et al.

In his most recent role, Pak served as VP, corporate counsel, cybersecurity and privacy, at Prudential Financial, where he managed incident response for matters involving significant potential loss or reputational risk, handled internal investigations, and provided counsel on data governance, identity theft prevention programmes, as well as privacy and cybersecurity regulations. 

“Erez and Andrew are both highly regarded cyber and data practitioners with exceptional credentials,” said Richard Cumbley, the firm’s global head of technology, media, telecoms & IP. “Data has no respect for national boundaries; it moves easily across the globe. It’s crucial for clients that their counsel can advise on data issues with the same global perspective. The addition of Erez and Andrew adds top drawer U.S. capability to our market-leading practices in Asia and Europe. We are thrilled to welcome them to the team.”

The U.S. data solutions, cyber and privacy practice expands Linklaters’ global technology, media, telecoms & IP practice and establishes a truly global data and cyber offering spanning a team of over 100 lawyers in Asia, Europe and the U.S. The firm said in a statement that the addition of a U.S. practice will give it greater breadth to advise clients on cybersecurity and data privacy as public focus on these issues has never been greater and the demand for expertise in this area continues to exponentially grow.