Lisa Ropple's documented education was centered in Massachusetts, where she studied at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester and later at Boston College Law School. She spent the academic year 1985 to 1986 studying law in Dublin, Ireland, before completing her legal education in Massachusetts. She was admitted to the Massachusetts bar in 1989, the year her professional legal career in Boston began.
Ropple earned a Bachelor of Arts from the College of the Holy Cross in 1984, graduating summa cum laude and as a member of Phi Beta Kappa, with English as her field of study. Holy Cross is a Jesuit college founded in 1843 in Worcester, Massachusetts, and its liberal arts curriculum reflects the educational tradition of the Society of Jesus. Phi Beta Kappa, the oldest academic honor society in the United States, recognizes undergraduate achievement in the liberal arts and sciences.
From 1985 to 1986 she studied law at Trinity College Dublin as a Rotary Scholar under the Rotary International Foundation Fellowship. Founded in 1592, Trinity is the oldest university in Ireland and a constituent college of the University of Dublin.
She then attended Boston College Law School, where she received a Juris Doctor magna cum laude in 1989 and ranked second in her class. Her honors included membership in the Order of the Coif, the national law school honor society, and she served as an articles editor of the Boston College Law Review. Boston College Law School, the law school of the Jesuit Boston College, was established in 1929 and is located in Newton, Massachusetts.
Ropple began her professional career in 1989, when she joined Ropes & Gray, a Boston law firm founded in 1865. She practiced there as a litigation partner, representing clients in complex civil litigation in federal and state courts and in government investigations. She later described twenty-two years of private practice at an AmLaw 25 firm before moving to in-house and other roles.
She then served at Staples, Inc., the office-supply retailer founded in 1986 in Massachusetts, as vice president and associate general counsel. In that role she supervised the company's response to data security incidents, directed strategy in regulatory investigations and litigation, and advised senior management on risk mitigation.
She joined the Boston office of Jones Day, a global law firm founded in 1893 in Cleveland, Ohio, as a partner in its Cybersecurity, Privacy & Data Protection and Government Regulation practices. At Jones Day she became co-leader of the firm's global Cybersecurity, Privacy & Data Protection Practice and head of litigation for the Boston office. Her work involves breach response, forensic investigations, notification obligations, and defense against investigations by agencies such as the FTC, the SEC, and state attorneys general.
The Legal 500 Jones Day profile identifies her as a leading cyber law partner and highlights matters including representation of Experian Information Solutions, Inc., in a lawsuit alleging a nationwide scheme by a plaintiffs' law firm, and of Ascension in a privacy investigation related to health care artificial intelligence. Jones Day publications and events have also featured her as a speaker and moderator, including a 2020 cyber attack simulation at the Boston Conference on Cybersecurity, presented by the FBI and Boston College. A Boston College speaker said she had run the conference's tabletop exercise since its inception.
Ropple has represented companies in matters arising from some of the largest, highest-profile data breaches, advising on incident response and defending clients in ensuing regulatory investigations and litigation. Legal 500 highlights her work for Point32Health in matters arising from a ransomware attack on Harvard Pilgrim Health Care.
Historic Lawsuit by Connecticut Attorney General for Security Breach Signals New Enforcement Landscape for Health Care Providers
(Published in the Health IT Law and Industry Report (BNA) ...)
2010Massachusetts Adopts Strict Security Regulations Governing Personal Information
(Published in the Privacy and Data Security Law Journal in...)
2009FTC Proposes Updates To The Health Breach Notification Rule For Health Apps And Consumer Health Technologies
(Co-authored with Alexis Gilroy, Mary Myers, and Claire Ca...)
2023China Issues Guidance on Filing of the Standard Contract for Cross-Border Transfers of Personal Information
(Co-authored with Elizabeth R. Cole, Olivier Haas, and Lil...)
2023Stopping Data Breaches Will Require Help from Governments
(Co-written with Samir C. Jain for Harvard Business Review...)
Ropple has been a member of the Boston Bar Association since October 1989. The association, founded in 1876, serves lawyers practicing in the Boston area. She is also a Fellow of the Litigation Counsel of America, an invitation-only organization of trial lawyers, and a member of the American Bar Association, the national professional association of American lawyers founded in 1878.
Quotes from others about the person
Legal 500 publishes anonymous client testimonials about Ropple, one of which describes her as "truly a superstar in the field of cyber law."
Ropple's documented professional collaborations include co-authorship of a Harvard Business Review article with Samir C. Jain, a fellow Jones Day lawyer who works in the firm's privacy and cybersecurity practice.
