City law firm RPC comments on Labour cyberattack

Earlier today media reported that the UK Labour Party became victim of a sophisticated Cyber attack.

Commenting on this and the wider legal concerns of cyber-attacks on political organisations, Richard Breavington, partner and Technology and Cyber Risk expert at the City law firm RPC said:

"The incident demonstrates the importance for all organisations who handle data, particularly personal data, to have plans and security in place to deal with attempted cyber-attacks. Perpetrators frequently attack when they expect organisations to be at their most busy and most stretched; as they are then most vulnerable, for political organisations it would be the election period. 

The current attack on the Labour Party serves as a reminder of the breadth of cyber-crime and that the motivations behind it can be political as well as financial. Most cybercrime is financially motivated. We have seen a considerable number of breaches involving less obvious targets, such as the charity and education sectors. These provide financial opportunity and in some cases less resource to dedicate to cyber security."