Legal Technology

Protecting confidentiality on a public WiFi network ...

Lawyers are becoming increasingly adept at using convenient technology, like laptop computers and wireless networking technology, to make their work easier and to provide prompt advice and services to clients. But when lawyers use WiFi to connect to the Internet or an office server to access e-mail or client documents, they risk the disclosure of sensitive data and confidential client information. Attorneys Joel Frank and Scot Withers provide some basic tips to protect data on public WiFi networks.

More and more courts ...

are using technology and electronic records management to open the courts up to the people and support pro se litigants. Once these inititatives meet e-filing projects, courts may be getting close to Tocqueville's Democracy in America (vol. 1, vol. 2)

It's a Mac, Mac world in San Francisco ...

this week with MacWorld. And from all appearances, it looks like a Grateful Dead concert. Noteworthy is Apple's continuing efforts to distribute movies online in hopes that its products capture the digital living room and bolster other core products, such as their new ultra-thin notebook computer dubbed MacBook Air and their new storage product called Time Capsule.

That's all well and good. Now we just need a plan to get from the living room to the corporate desktop. Perhaps we need to designate a "bring your Mac to work day" or move the corporate office to the living room.

Test data has privacy implications ...

A study found that companies test applications with real data. Compuware and the Ponemon Institute revealed that companies use real data to develop and test their applications. There's nothing like being able to test your wares out with the real McCoy, but that does have some implications for privacy.

Microsoft hypervisor in Server 2008 ...

The buzz about virtualization is not going away any time soon. Especially since we're getting more and more cores on a chip. An easy way to check it out is with Microsoft's Windows Server 2008 Release Candidate Evaluation Software, where you can download a trial version of Microsoft's hypervisor and try it for 30 days. But note that an x64 server is required. If you try this, try Microsoft System Center Virtual Machine Manager as well. One of the differentiators to virtualization will be managing, as well as running, a virtualized environment.

Tech makes it a good time to be blind ...

It's not hard to imagine how the blind view the world. Close your eyes for a period of time and try to operate as you normally would. Now try to imagine accomplishing work as a blind attorney, such as William Grignon, an associate at Kirkland & Ellis in San Francisco, or Bountiful, Utah attorney Ron Gardner who was recently appointed by President Bush to the U.S. Access Board, an independent federal agency that works to increase accessibility for people with disabilities.

Both Grignon and Gardner use technology to make life and work easier. Grignon uses a screen reader and text-based programs. Gardner uses a small, screen-less braille computer to check appointments and surf the Web. In Gardner's words, "It's such a great time to be a blind guy."

And it appears to be getting better. NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology) has licensed two technologies that could bring affordable graphic reading systems to the blind and visually impaired. The two systems bring electronic images to life in the same way that Braille makes words readable.

Citizen portal for public records

There's a new Web portal out there for your review that holds all the facts that every citizen should know about U.S. public records. And that includes lawyers too. USPublicRecords.com educates citizens, lawyers, judges and even agencies on how to find public records.

Consumer electronics show ...

You know where I should be right now: the International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. The geek gateway to 2008 and beyond. I have heard that robots are walking the floor and that they are testing automated automobiles. And, that voice is making a big splash again.

For example, One Voice Technologies, Inc. announced that they will be demonstrating voice control for Intel Mobile Internet Devices (MID) to play music, view photos and videos, chat, retrieve maps and driving directions and search the Internet all by voice.

I've been talking to machines for years, but they respond about as well as teenagers when asked about their comings and goings. And every year I keep the item "talk to your computer" on my New Year's Resolution list.

So when I hear that voice input is going to change how we interface with computers and handheld devices, a tingle runs down my carpal tunnel and I whisper to my keyboard: You're dead, dude.

Information about the people ...

People would be more secure in their personal information if they owned it and controlled it wherever it was stored, but that has not been the case in the U.S. Now, the IRS has stepped forward and afforded tax payers more privacy and control on the information in their return. Tax preparers must disclose and obtain consent of the tax payer when they send a return to a preparer overseas. This could mark the beginning of regulations on information transmitted offshore and more oversight in offshore outsourcing. Something to watch as more U.S. e-discovery is processed offshore.