17. A former client just sued you for malpractice. Fortunately, you have malpractice insurance, so the costs of defending this legal action and any possible costs of settlement or liability will be borne by the insurance company.

According to your malpractice policy, you have a duty to promptly notify them about any actual or threatened lawsuit. Further, you must fully assist them in aggressively defending you in the lawsuit. The insurance company now has asked you to provide to them all documents that relate to your professional engagement with this former client. You are concerned that some of these documents contain information that the former client considers to be confidential and, indeed, is marked in bold red letters HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL. You certainly do not want to face another lawsuit from this same client for breaching your duty of confidentiality. What should you do?

19. A 19-year-old staff member at your accounting firm went into your computer system and copied the names, addresses, and identifying numbers of clients who pay your firm by credit card. As a result of this identity theft, your clients lost thousands of dollars.

When you first hired this young staff member, you did not investigate whether this staff member had a criminal record. If you had, you would have learned that this staff member had been arrested

once in the past when he was younger for Driving Under the Influence. Some of your clients who suffered losses now claim that you violated your duty of confidentiality. Did you?