Paul Hastings had an unfortunate technical screw-up in the UK and informed the nearly 400 young lawyers applying for its training contract program that the deadline would be extended. Unfortunately, this notification created a second, much bigger technical mishap when every applicant meant to be blind copied was carbon copied instead.
Legal Cheek has the scoop on the email mishap that allowed every applicant to see just who they’re competing against for the job:
The email — sent by an external company to applicants yesterday morning, and seen by Legal Cheek — flagged “technical problems” with the service provider’s external website on training contract deadline day yesterday. Paul Hastings accordingly extended the deadline for its 2021 trainee scheme until today.
What would have been a well-intentioned gesture, unfortunately, backfired, when the email was sent out with all 388 prospective applicants’ email addresses (some of which featured the names of candidates) in the ‘Cc’ field rather than the ‘Bcc’ one.
The email was sent by Thomson Reuters, which is looking into how it came to pass.
While certainly embarrassing, this shouldn’t be blown out of proportion into some Capital One-level data breach. It’s not like this email posted everybody’s transcript or anything — applying to work at a well-respected law firm isn’t a dirty little secret. If anything, everyone involved should be happy that the foul-up didn’t expose anything more damaging and can use this occasion to tighten up their controls.
To put it in terms the players will appreciate, think of every crisis as an email and opportunity as the bcc!
US firm Paul Hastings in email blunder that lets prospective trainees see who they’re up against [Legal Cheek]
Joe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.