WASHINGTON, D.C., Feb. 12, 2013 — The American Bar Association Standing Committee on Law and National Security has made available a podcast of its Midyear Meeting panel, entitled “Active Cyber Defense: Emerging Legal Dialogue.”

Until recently, self-defense in cyberspace was called “hackback” and was largely dismissed by the legal community as beyond the law.  However, cyber experts and the private sector are embracing “active defense,” as the range of options is collectively labeled.  As a result, lawyers are opening a dialogue on how to explore the issue in the courts and the potential legal precedents in case law.

The panel, which took place on Saturday, Feb. 9, in Dallas, included Stewart Baker, partner at Steptoe Johnson and former general counsel to the National Security Agency, Steven Chabinsky, senior vice president of legal affairs and chief risk officer for CrowdStrike, and Emily Frye, principal engineer for the Mitre Corp. The panel was moderated by Harvey Rishikof, Drexel University law professor and chair of the ABA Advisory Committee on Law and National Security.

The program was co-sponsored by the ABA Cybersecurity Legal Task Force, the Government and Public Sector Lawyers Division and the Section of Science and Technology Law.

To listen to the podcast, click here.  For questions about the podcast, please contact Meredith Josef at Meredith.Josef@americanbar.org.

To view the ABA’s newly launched Cybersecurity Legal Task Force website, click here.

With nearly 400,000 members, the American Bar Association is one of the largest voluntary professional membership organizations in the world.  As the national voice of the legal profession, the ABA works to improve the administration of justice, promotes programs that assist lawyers and judges in their work, accredits law schools, provides continuing legal education, and works to build public understanding around the world of the importance of the rule of law.