Category Archives: Technology

Core technology discussions

ILTACON – Legal Technology Innovation: Bolstering and Destroying the Legal Profession

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By Joseph Raczynski

The Napsterization of the legal industry is growing more plausible every day. The innovation and disruption seen in the music business around digitization and file sharing is happening right now to the legal industry.

Ryan McClead of Norton Rose Fulbright led a panel discussion, “Legal Technology Innovation: Bolstering and Destroying the Legal Profession,” at ILTACON 2015. Looking at the current state of the legal market, McClead drew a comparison to Napster and record companies circa 1999. The music industry thought their customers were interested in the CD and the packaging. The reality was all customers wanted was the music. Napster saw this and without intending to do so, used common technology to disrupt the record business.

McClead then applied this logic to the legal industry. His premise: law firms think that they are selling a lawyer’s time. However, if you ask a lawyer’s customers, they are most interested in the outcome, not the time itself. Law firms must adopt new technologies which focus on the outcome, not the time spent billing or even fixed pricing. With automation, firms can begin to replicate processes; establishing a faster, better, cheaper solution for their client.

McClead stated to the audience that the legal industry is partaking in its own version of the Napster event, adding “We have a choice to restructure our firms, rebuild our processes or the industry can do nothing, maintaining the status quo and see what happens.”

Stuart Barr, Chief Strategy Officer for HighQ, had an equally riveting discussion. He spoke about the real fears and promises of what is coming in legal. He noted that the advent of cognitive computing will see white collar jobs being eliminated. Using various examples, Barr cited how the revolution started with blue collar positions being jettisoned and will shift to white collar workers soon.

While jobs are being eliminated, new opportunities are emerging. Eight years ago, the mobile app industry didn’t exist; now it is a $100 billion business. Barr suggests that the legal industry will shift and lawyers will have to become more technical. He calls this new lawyer a hybrid legal engineer who knows both the law and technology.

The last discussion of the panel focused around M&A and contracts. In this arena, the panel saw huge possibilities leveraging cognitive computing. Currently a firm might review only the top 300 of 10,000 contracts for a large corporation’s pending merger. The firm may charge $500,000 for this work. The corporation is taking a gamble by not having the other contracts reviewed to save some money. With contract reviewing software, a law firm could offer to review 1,000 contracts for $750,000. In this scenario, both the corporation and law firm win.

The panel left many jaws agape after their rapid fire predictions. There is little question that many of these technologies are going to have a significant impact on the legal industry in the months and years to come.

The World of Advanced Endpoint Security

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By Joseph Raczynski

Surprisingly the vendors in cybersecurity differ on their approaches to protecting your law firm. At the ILTA LegalSEC Summit 2015 in Baltimore, MD they had a panel discussion on how each vendor tackles the ever bounding threats.  For background when this post refers to endpoint security I am describing securing the user at the device level; i.e. the mobile phone or individual’s computer.

Gal Badishi of Palo Alto Networks started off his analysis with ominous statistics.  On average a firm does not recognize that they have been breached for 225 days after the initial strike.  In addition, of those attacks, 84% are found by third parties.  His primary theme throughout the conversation to counter these attacks was the proper implementation of a “Next Generation Firewall.”  This is defined on Wikipedia as “an integrated network platform that combines a traditional firewall with other network device filtering functionalities such as an application firewall using in-line deep packet inspection (DPI), an intrusion prevention system (IPS) and/or other techniques such as SSL and SSH interception, website filtering, QoS/bandwidth management, antivirus inspection and third-party integration (i.e. Active Directory).” (Wiki, 6/14/2015)

Keith Palumbo of Cylance fascinated the audience with a unique and futuristic tact to cybersecurity for law firms.  They use a form of Artificial Intelligence to uncover and deflect penetration from malicious intruders.  In fact Keith described the use of mathematical endpoint solutions including algorithms to help predict what types of “ones and zeros” will be malicious based on like or similar files.  Their equations employ similar processes financial institutions have devised for rapid electronic trading.  The cutting edge autonomous driving cars also operate under similar algorithms.  What fosters this is the utilization of extremely efficient computers and their prowess in mathematical processing.  In essence, Cylance collects samples of viruses, extracts common features in the code then transforms that code into feasible branch code.  At this stage the software vectorizes the viruses to then train the system on what might arrive at the firm’s door.  Finally it classifies the virus and clusters it into a defined grouping for future learning.

The third speaker, Harry Sverdlove of Bit9 begin his discussion with the statement that, “antivirus protection is almost pointless.”  He noted that what firms have been employing for the last 20 years with virus detection through updates is dead.  With the number of virus on the Internet, there is no feasible way to scan, collect, submit and maintain a log of the rapidly changing viruses.

Harry suggested that each firm start from the assumption they are or will be breached.  He painted an example of a house that a thief gains access to daily.  If you think about it in this sense, prevention of that thief from entering is no longer enough.  Firms must invest in detection and response.  Most firms do not have systems that seek out real-time detection mechanisms.  This lends itself to much longer periods of time that the thief remains inside the firm’s firewall.  If the initial firewall breach was not detected by the firm, that intruder could remain inside for significant periods of time.

Ultimately the three panelist concluded that a three pronged approach to endpoint security was necessary; prevention techniques, detection once the breech has occurred, and lastly creating a documented response using various tools and processes.  Whatever solution, they all suggested turning your firm data (logs, user profiles, patterns of access) into intelligence.  If you set precedents for how people access your network, you can identify the variance and seize the thief.

Citation:

Wikipedia, Next-Generation Firewall, 6/14/2015, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Next-Generation_Firewall

 

Stanford, Sights Set on Legal: Part 1 – Fidelity Investments Estate Planning

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By Joseph Raczynski

The Legal Lessons Learned from Stanford Series

Stanford University is fully embracing the legal industry, a historically cautious mover, as a focal point of its innovative solutions.  The industry is primed to evolve through more transformative processes by pairing inventive thought and applied technological advancement to solve niche legal process issues.  Recently at the Emerging Legal Technology Forum, hosted by Thomson Reuters and Stanford University, we learned how and what the school has developed to initiate increased efficiencies in this arena.

Designing a Better Legal Process:

Fidelity Investments had a problem.  They have 20 million customers and 70% of them did not have an estate plan.  Being a customer centric organization they wanted to significantly lower that gap.  Fidelity reached out to Stanford and the school brought the Design School (d.School) and Law School together to collaborate.  Margaret Hagan of the Stanford Institute of Design and Philippe Mauldin of Fidelity used some of the basics of the design program to figure out how to help find a solution.  Interestingly enough, core to this process was determining what the problem was, and not focusing on the solution.  They began by visiting people’s homes to see firsthand what their customers chatted about when it came to finances.  Fidelity had a focus on how they could help people protect their assets.  What they uncovered is that the problem was education which bled into a lack of execution for their customers.  Simply stated, people did not know what they did not know and so they did nothing.

Fidelity went back to Stanford and they all collaborated on what this process of establishing a state plan would look like on fideleity.com.  Their focus was on how to help the customer prepare.  Thus they created a wizard interface with step by step templates from Stanford Law School and linking out for complex legal terms.  In addition the wizard helped guide users through a list of pertinent information assisting them in preparation about decisions that they would have to make.  Once that piece was completed the next step was to assist people in partnering with trusted attorneys.  Stanford ultimately recommended a vetted attorney for each state to keep in compliance for local jurisdictions and to review finalized documents.

 

In an effort to create a simple legal process, driving understanding and efficiency, Stanford combined their Design School with the Law School through a real world problem to create a better customer experience.  In the next post I will delve into how the d.School tactically innovates through process which I believe all industries could benefit.

Google Glass – Thoughts on Glass: Privacy, Security and Its Future

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By Joseph Raczynski

This is part two in a series of video’s surrounding Google Glass. This is the Privacy, Security and future of Google Glass. In this video we get to see the complete Google Glass. Take a look at the Google Glass Explorer program.

Glass Series Includes:

1) Glass Unboxing

2) Thoughts on Glass: Privacy, Security and Its Future

3) Usability Demo

4) Law Firms and Glass

5) Full Demo

 

Google Glass – GPS Navigation

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By Joseph Raczynski

This is part five in a series of video’s surrounding Google Glass. This is the GPS Navigation demo of Google Glass. In this video we get to see the complete navigation of Google Glass. Take a look at the Google Glass Explorer program.

Glass Series Includes:
1) Glass Unboxing
2) Thoughts on Glass: Privacy, Security and Its Future
3) GPS Navigation
4) Law Firms and Glass

5) Full Demo

Google Glass – Full Demo

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By Joseph Raczynski

This is part five in a series of video’s surrounding Google Glass. This is the full demo of Google Glass. In this video we get to see the complete Google Glass. Take a look at the Google Glass Explorer program.

Glass Series Includes:

1) Glass Unboxing

2) Thoughts on Glass: Privacy, Security and Its Future

3) Usability Demo

4) Law Firms and Glass

5) Full Demo

Google Glass – Unboxing

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By Joseph Raczynski

This is part one in a series of video’s surrounding Google Glass. This is the unboxing of Google Glass. In this video we get to see how Glass is packaged and what comes with the device. Take a look at the Google Glass Explorer program.

Glass Series Includes:

1) Glass Unboxing

2) Thoughts on Glass: Privacy, Security and Its Future

3) Usability Demo

4) Law Firms and Glass

5) Full Demo

 

Enterprise Content Management: Integrating KM, RM and DM

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By Joseph Raczynski

Massive collections of information are inundating law firms.  With multiple points of integration, interfaces, and varying disciplines this further muddies the waters.  This session at ILTA answered questions relating the issues of organizing and managing content across all firm repositories to reduce silos, improve data quality, facilitate KM and ensure full and accurate firm records.

The goal of most firms now is to devise an ECM (Enterprise Content Management) system which includes connecting all of the following silos of information: email, DMS, KM system, records management system and others.

This is a cumbersome process because each data set is unique and live in differing systems.  Another issue, rarely understood, is that storage of data is not cheap.  With the necessities of infrastructure, backing up and maintaining data and a facility is rather expensive.

Another area of consideration is risk management.  A firm must be able to craft policies about enterprise information management.  That is, how does the firm handle electronic discovery and where is it stored?  Who has rights to the data?  How should users get access to it and how long should it be stored?

Additionally law firms must consider the client-side challenges.  Typically if not planned out, users at a firm can experience time consuming search for documents.  They also can learn that it is difficult to “find” documents located in various locations.

In essence, firms must build “tridges”, multi-pointed bridges which connect all groups and information together. To do so a firm needs to:

  • Understand there will be some hard cultural changes at the firm
  • Find top level champions to be brought on board for support of the ECM
  • The organization must highlight (WIIFM) What Is In it For Me… so that all aspects of the organization can see how they fit in
  • Address user concerns by showing them what will be brought into via search on the ECM. By doing this you create a vested interest and they typically like seeing their work product pulled up in the searches

Ultimately when conjoining all of the various disparate pieces of information together, there are several point to consider:

  • The process has to be defined and paramount to this is communication. Among all of the parties which will be involved in the ECM process, making sure everyone is on the same page is critical
  • Define objectives: every aspect of what the firm wishes to have as a net result must be detailed
  • Redefine the process. Understand that many new processes will evolve which will then be disseminated across the organization
  • Understand that technologies can get in the way of each other and be prepared for these temporary setbacks.
  • Lastly accept and accommodate the delta; i.e. know that all of these things can get you so far but you still have a system that will need to be adjusted over time

Portal Trends at Law Firms

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By Joseph Raczynski

Significant trends are finally emerging in portal usage by the Am Law 100.  After years of vacillating about platforms, purpose, and its promise many firms have bought into the reality that portal is for real.

Based on legal conferences and consultations with C-level officers over the last several months, the following themes are developing among the largest firms in the country:

  • SharePoint is undoubtedly the leader as the main flavor of portal at large law firms.  With SharePoint 2010, the latest version available, the market share is sure to increase over the next four quarters.  SP 2010 is far more user friendly and it includes FAST, an enterprise search tool that is highly regarded.
  • Firms are integrating all aspects of their business into one sphere.  The goal is to surface valuable internal information thus synthesizing: extranet, business development, current awareness, contact management, DMS, knowledge management, human resources data, client information, social media, and time and billing among others.

The particular specifics:

  • Extranet is massive.  It has become a huge advantage for firms.  One newer use of extranet is to demo the capabilities of the firm at client pitch meetings.  Showing that the firm can establish a secure, intelligent environment before the client signs on has been very effective.  Typically these client pages can contain: RSS feeds of client news, team members, meeting calendars, open matters, stock ticker, blog, team discussion, billing, and docket alerts.  It is an excellent selling point for the firm.
  • Community blogging is gaining traction.  However, firms that have had the best luck typically have chosen stakeholders, higher profile attorney’s, or firm experts who write.  They tend to gain followers quickly building a community which cascades down and encourages other experts to blog or comment.
  • Attorney profiles are far more robust with portal.  Firms are establishing “LinkedIn-esq” profiles which attorneys are responsible for maintaining.  New aspects include short bio informational videos, completed work at the firm, areas of expertise, and tagged work, i.e. work completed so if like cases arise at the firm they can be tapped.  Ultimately the firm is creating a searchable knowledge share of personalize individualized attorney portraits.  This is an excellent tool to find experience colleagues within the firm.
  • Enterprise search, i.e. searching across disparate repositories of information at the firm, is the primary push and becoming very effective.  The sought after federated search, searching internally and over the web, is still somewhat elusive, but gaining traction with better technology.
  • Portal ROI once a subject of examination is far less challenged now.  As one firm stated, “Asking for a ROI for portal expense is akin to asking a partner to quantify ROI for the NBA season box seats the firm bought.  You just know it works.”

 

The innovative trends are targeting content, surfacing internal data, then indexing, and ultimately utilizing algorithmic enterprise search.  In addition firms are integrating applications and repositories with their portal.  Lastly they are increasing use of Web 2.0 applications like blogging, tagging, and client/user forums.  All of these portal trends integrated together build a vastly more connected, agile, and responsive firm.

Twitter the Next Biggest Connective Development for Humans

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By Joseph Raczynski

“Twitter could be the next biggest connective development for humans, bigger than TV.”

That is what someone who has been working with the development of Twitter told the audience at a legal technology conference I was at in NYC a few months ago.

Here is the rationale.  Think of Twitter as an army of millions of mobile reporters.  People tweet all over the world.  People tweet in war zones, at major events, but more importantly they tweet where an event happens and there are no news reporters available, yet.  They are the first person on the scene accounts.

The key to this whole development is the open API which allows for applications to be created by anyone so that Tweets can be gathered, processed and understood in mass.

News companies are major adopters of reading Tweets.  In fact, there is an application that categories Tweets coming from different parts of the world, or state, or topic area.  They search on key words like “Middle East” or “Bomb” or “Providence”… whatever you can imagine.  They have huge digital boards, and people can monitor all the activity of the tweets that come in, and see what those army of millions of mobile reporters are saying.  To make this all better… People can also send pictures, and I see video is not too far behind.  So think about a breakout of a mob in Southie… people would Tweet on that and send pictures far before some news crew could get there.  It is like news immediately, even more immediate that what we have traditionally thought of as immediate.

The big part that people miss is the search function.  Go to http://search.twitter.com from that site you can search on anything you like.  Look for a restaurant in your area that you wonder if is any good.  People probably have tweeted about it.  Marketing companies are finally seeing this as a way to find out what people think about good or services in real time.

When you tweet, you are actually tweeting to the whole world, so ask a question, and you are likely to get an answer.  The bigger following you have the better the response.  When I was in NYC I asked about a restaurant… I said, “What do people think of 5 Napkin Burger”?  And via my immediate responses, I got a good sense that the place is damn solid.

So from my vantage point, it is a cool app, in its infancy.  There is way more to it that some guy saying, “I just ate a whole cherry pie.”  Seriously, it will make waves for a reason, and will continue to do so.