Erin M. Prest

Erin Prest is co-leader of McCarter & English’s Cybersecurity & Data Privacy group. A former Privacy & Civil Liberties Officer and Deputy General Counsel at the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Erin’s deep experience lies at the intersection of federal privacy law and data security strategy. She provides counseling and business strategies regarding data privacy, incident response planning, and the evaluation of new enterprise technologies at all stages of the information lifecycle. She advises clients on data breaches, collection and use of sensitive information such as biometric data and commercially available information, and artificial intelligence.

Known for her practical approach to finding custom-tailored solutions using privacy by design, Erin helps clients confronted with data breaches, ransomware attacks, or other pressing or high-stakes data privacy issues. Her experience with data privacy analysis includes crafting bespoke solutions for keeping data safe and protecting privacy. She excels at the analysis of programs and their data in order to provide proactive counseling regarding potential risks and ways to mitigate them. Erin provides end-to-end data privacy counsel and analysis.

Erin served as one of three executives overseeing the implementation of artificial intelligence and governance at the FBI. In this role, she worked with tech personnel, executives, and all levels of personnel across the federal government to help shape and craft the governance process in order to implement meaningful but practical solutions. Erin provides practical, hands-on experience for clients who are evaluating use of and developing program management of artificial intelligence while maximizing its potential.

In her 18 years at the FBI, Erin supervised approximately 100 attorneys, special agents, paralegals, and professional staff handling all legal matters related to investigative and administrative law—from regulatory creation and compliance to operational legal advice. She also oversaw the legal guidance related to criminal investigative activities, crisis response, procurement, criminal history information, and DNA matters among others.

Erin earned her JD from Case Western Reserve School of Law and BA from the University of Michigan. After law school, she entered the government as a counterterrorism analyst through the Presidential Management Fellows Program and served as a Special Assistant U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia.