pm blog

Author’s Note: This year I got to blog the ABA Technology Show once again as I did last year in this pair of posts here and here. In addition, this year I was given the opportunity to publish my work in the prestigious publication TechnoLawyer. And on a related (and equally important) note, this was the second year in a row that I was sponsored by the august DuPage County Bar Association, thanks to the hard work of directrix and champion of technology, Glenda Sharp. To Glenda and this year’s bar President, Fred Spitzzeri, a great big Thank You! Here’s to doing it again next year …

I Attended ABA TECHSHOW 2008 and All I Got Was This Lousy Blog Post

Eliminating the Paper Chase: From Boxes to Bytes (Paperless Office Track)

A Real World EDD Motion Hearing (Litigation Track)

The Mobile Office: Take Your Desktop in Your Pocket (Mobile Technology Track)

Outlook Tips and Tricks (Roundtables Track)

So You Want to Be an ABA Author? (Special Session)

Beating the Startup Blues: A Tech Survival Guide (Solo/Small Firm II Track)

Grand Finale: 60 Sites In 60 Minutes

Crazy Mazy’s Best of Show: SQ Global Solutions

Crazy Mazy’s Best of Show: Legal Bar by BEC Legal Systems

Crazy Mazy’s Best of Show: Electronic Discovery

Crazy Mazy’s Best of Show: Adobe Acrobat Professional

A Report from the Exhibit Hall and Suggestions for TechShow 2009

Court Approved Forensic Computer Examination

Inevitably, most commercial litigators have or will be facing an electronic discovery dispute that develops in such a way that a computer examination order is necessary to satisfy the reasonable demands of a requesting party. Of course, if your client is on the producing side, a computer examination request may not seem so reasonable.Nevertheless, a court order to allow the requesting party to conduct the forensic imaging and subsequent search and examination for relevant electronically stored information (ESI) is a process that most state and federal courts will exercise their prerogative to implement a suitable protocol should the counsel for both parties fail to submit such a protocol.

Our firm strongly recommends that every effort be made in anticipation of a court ruling which would permit a forensic computer examination, to develop a fair and reasonable protocol that would cover the complete process and methodology to be followed by the forensic technician. Some considerations for the protocol might be:

1. Provisions for opposing partys computer expert to be present in order to observe the assigned forensic technicians practices in acquiring the bit-stream copies of the subject computers and/or media storage devices.

2. Provisions for two copies of each forensic bit-stream image to be produced-one for the examiner and the other for the producing party.

3. Instructions for the forensic examiner to conduct the search and recovery of ESI within the agreed upon search parameters:

a. List of search terms e.g., specific words, terms, sentences, names, specific dates, e-mail addresses, distinct descriptions etc. developed by both parties.

b. Search and recovery of computer users Internet history if applicable.

c. Examination and review of computer users software/hardware installation and de-installation history.

d. Search and review of all relevant computer system artifacts pertaining to the relevant actions of the user in timeline of interest.

4. Instruct the forensic examiner to generate a search hit summary report to both parties which is a numeric tally of hit results associated with each search term used to conduct the word search phase of the forensic examination. This provides full disclosure to both parties and the Court of the initial results.

5. Provisions to have the forensic examiner copy all search results onto a CD or DVD and have delivered to the producing party for their pre-production review process.

6. Upon completion of the pre-production review, the producing party will submit a privilege log along with their production less any identified privileged ESI.

You can call Cybercontrols at 847-756-4890 or find them online at www.cybercontrols.net.

Law.com has 2 recent posting this LPM member strongly encourages you review:

    What to do without local E-Discovery Rules……
   Amy Karan and Kansas Gooden point out: Lawyers should advise clients to develop a
   written document retention policy and sensitize clients to the potential risks
   including sanctions and adverse inferences for violations.

    Ignore Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX 404)at your Peril………
   Thus, it is critical for every entity to ensure that its records-retention policy
    includes appropriate triggers — called “litigation holds”

      It’s always alot easier to expand a relationship with a current client vs finding a new one.   Sales/Marketing 101.  Obviously previous posts on this subject gathered limited interest.  Since I consultant “Storage Solutions” to Mid-size companies here are some responses from clients I’m suppose too help:

• “since there is no HIPPA police, why get crazy..”  Senior Living complex
• “our competitors get sued, that’s our growth…”    Manufacture
• “we have never had that issue, don’t see it…”        Trucking firm
• “email’s, individuals cancel their own…”                  International Exporter
• “worse scenerio, we’ll pay some silly fine…”            Property Management Firm

     I’m sure Mazy has a smile reading this:  Bankruptcy Clients….

As with previous post(s), we have explored the reality of IT people acting as “Guardians” with compliance issues that role into eDiscovery availability.   The topic is something the LPM Committee will not let die.

Strolling through numerous sources of information we come across this listing that begs for commentary reaction:

FRCP looking like a PITW (Pain in the Wallet)
March 6th, 2008 by Tory Skyers

Note:   There’s a “Safe Harbor” clause in the FRCP that absolves companies of responsibility if the company has — and strictly follows — a deletion and retention policy. This protects the company from falling afoul of the regulation, but does my act (as an end user) of deleting an email fall under the “Safe Harbor” clause?

Let me put on my lawyer hat. Okay, it’s on. I’ve seen some precedent that leads me to believe that simply having and following a policy is not enough. …………

Hello!  Can anyone see the opportunity here.  Confusion begs for billable knowledge.  This is just a sampling of something that is repeated daily in many businesses right here in DuPage.   But this LPM member is needing too go a step further.  I need a partner to help me address these issues with MY clients.  Building physical storage solutions without updated Retention/Deletion policies is like putting on your pants an leaving the zipper open.

What I fail to understand is this readerships inability to visualize this opportunity  an act on it.  Especially, when I have yet too meet anyone that could not use another client.   Clients pay me for a solution, which means I better have good vendors.   Maybe I’m addressing the wrong crowd……

A common theme among most Legal blogs - sharing technology advise or heads up on new products that will enhance productivity of said firm(s) or lawyers service.

Like most, we here (@ LPM Committee)do our fair share of staying in-touch with potential game breakers. What is of note - the market segmentation. Either the product or service is not focused on 70%, or in most cases, 70% has no motivation too part with their money on infrastructure that is not in the top 12 goals of said group. But there is another area that is slowly coming too the forefront that will force the said 70% to rethink their position.

Courts and Court Reporters across the country are moving into the digital age with products like: FTR HEARINGS 3.3

Rob Gambell, FTR Channel Sales Rep, did a demo yesterday for a client of mine that answered many questions. An the biggest being managing said content. Play-backs, quality of sound, tabs, inserted notes, etc..

Taking note of the numerous State Courts within Illinois that already use FTR Products and an installed base of over 22,000 courts worldwide, this is not something that showed up yesterday.

Now picture this. What if, instead of recieving 50 pages of paper that you turn-around an scan or if your on-top of it a .pdf. You still have to load the document into whatever tool your going to use. What if you had a digital audio file with bookmarks and tabs. According to FTR, download the FREE player an your good to go. Maybe it’s me, but that does seem like a more suitable solution in today’s ever changing emotional based envirnoment.

Contact CTC local Authorized Reseller

It all about Content Management. And we haven’t even brought up video…..stay tuned….

 This cover-story in the March 2008 edition of the ABA Journal features our colleague and friend of the pm blog, Rick Futurelawyer Georges. Go get ‘em, Rick.

The decades-long Mac versus PC battle recalls those video games in which the Big Boss Bad Guy just can’t seem to squash our nim­ble little hero. Clever marketing and product development vie against massive market share. And with each round, the question grows: Is there a reason to switch to Apple, and is now the time? This year the ABA Journal is letting some real advocates argue the case. Ben Stevens and Rick Georges are not only lawyers using opposing systems; they are proponents who advise on the use of technology in the law office. They have strong opinions, and they’re not afraid to state them. No games, no rules and no punches pulled. [read more]