McDonald Hopkins welcomes former Indiana Deputy Attorney General Heather Shumaker to the national Data Privacy and Cybersecurity Team
DETROIT — Heather Shumaker has joined McDonald Hopkins LLC as an associate in the Litigation Department, adding her experience to the firm’s national Data Privacy and Cybersecurity Practice Group.
Shumaker is accredited by the International Association of Privacy Professionals as a Certified Information Privacy Professional for the United States Private Sector, the gold standard certification for information privacy professionals. Her practice focuses on advising companies in a wide variety of industries on addressing data privacy and cybersecurity incidents, as well as ensuring state and federal compliance including, but not limited to, reviewing policies and procedures, risk assessments and risk analysis, and PCI DSS standards, and negotiating complex settlement agreements, protective orders, confidentiality agreements, common interest agreements, memoranda of understanding and other types of contracts.
Shumaker’s data privacy expertise stems from her time as Deputy Attorney General in the Data Privacy and Identity Theft Unit for the Office of Indiana Attorney General. In her role there, she provided internal data privacy counsel on the applicability of federal and state data privacy regulations, including CAN-SPAM, TCPA and TSR while also representing the State of Indiana in complex litigation in various specialized areas including consumer protection laws, HIPAA and telephone privacy laws.
“In this constantly evolving area of law, it is extremely valuable to add an attorney with Heather’s experience, which includes a wide range of critical litigation work for the office of Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita,” said Jim Giszczak, co-chair of the national Data Privacy and Cybersecurity Practice Group. “Heather has an intimate understanding of how Indiana became a leader in the United States through a commitment to enforcing its Disclosure of Security Breach law and protecting businesses and citizens who discover their valuable information is in jeopardy. That acumen will be a vital asset to McDonald Hopkins clients.”
Shumaker earned her JD from Indiana University Robert H. McKinney School of Law. She graduated from Indiana University with a Bachelor of Arts in political science. In addition to her role at McDonald Hopkins, Shumaker serves as adjunct faculty for Indiana University and Purdue University. She is admitted to practice law in Indiana.
About McDonald Hopkins National Data Privacy and Cybersecurity Practice Group
The national Data Privacy and Cybersecurity team at McDonald Hopkins has counseled clients in nearly every industry through thousands of data breaches and privacy incidents. We have a wealth of experience advising clients on best practices for data privacy, security, storage, transmission and disposal, and specialize in advising clients through the myriad of rapidly changing privacy and breach notification laws, dra¬fting and implementing proactive policies and training. Our experienced team provides client support during investigations by state, federal and international regulators. Our team also has experience handling data privacy litigation on behalf of a wide variety of both large and small companies in numerous industries, with cases ranging from single-plaintiff negligence claims, to multi-count class actions involving thousands of putative class members arising from large-scale breaches and data privacy statutes, such as Illinois’ Biometric Information Privacy Act.
