Cybersecurity Enforcement Hooks For The SEC

The SEC’s interest in cybersecurity began modestly enough in 2011 with letters requesting information, but it quickly moved to include  enforcement actions. In 2014 and continuing this year, numerous comments by SEC officials, from the chair on down, have made it clear that cybersecurity is now a major enforcement priority. Attorneys from Wilmer Hale, writing in the firm’s Cybersecurity Law Report, discuss the two main theories under which enforcement is taking place, and how they are being applied. They also see a third theory in the wings, one that would apply when hacked M&A-related information allegedly gets used to facilitate insider trading.