The practice of law dates to ancient Greece and Rome. While there have been many changes over the course of the years, never in history have regulations been as mandated as they are now with the use of technology. While at their core the primary duties of today’s attorney are to draft legal documents and communicate with clients, this workflow touches many systems, and work product is accessed across a wide variety of repositories and devices.
Over three decades we have witnessed the introduction of email, document management and, of late, the cloud. While the objective has always been to make the modern attorney more efficient, with great technology comes greater responsibility. Today, the fact that a firm invests in IT brings with it the duty to protect information and reduce risk to the firm. It wasn’t long ago that the industry was abuzz over HIPAA. Now we’re focused on regulations from clients, states and foreign governments. Many of the Am Law 200 have invested in obtaining certifications such as SOC 2 and ISO 27001.
