Site-tation--November 2008-January 2009
Site-tation is our monthly e-newsletter highlighting new or useful websites of interest to attorneys and other legal professionals.
The LTRC is happy to announce that ABA Site-tation, the blog of the ABA Legal Technology Resource Center, has moved to a new platform and a new address. The blog can now be accessed at: http://new.abanet.org/sitetation/. RSS subscribers will need to adjust their feed readers to point to the new RSS feed, and as always, ABA Site-tation is also available as a monthly e-Newsletter.
Blogging host JournalSpace suffered a wipe-out of their main database for which there was no back-up in place leaving users of the six year old service in dire straits. This raises the question for bloggers; what is your service provider's backup and restoration policies and procedures? If you are your own service provider, can you satisfactorily answer that question?
A failure to establish and practice a backup policy destroyed thousands of blogs and reduced JournalSpace membership to fewer than three hundred members. Could your law practice survive a similar disaster? ABA Members enjoy discounted secure online backup options with Mozy and data security solutions with i365. We've included some additional resources to consider while reviewing your backup and restoration policies.
Hat tip to legal blogger Nerino Petro for the heads-up on this issue.
Resources
FYI: The Ethics of Online Backup Systems
Friday PMA Blog Roundup - Includes Nerino Petro's helpful listing of 13 Free Backup Tools
Master Your Disaster - Online Backup by Dennis Kennedy
SmallLaw: The Ultimate Backup Regimen for Law Firms - Ross Kodner's column for the TechnoLawyer Blog (Free registration required)
-Tonya L. Johnson
Massachusetts issued new regulations regarding data encryption, effective January 1, 2009, but granted an extension for compliance until May 1, 2009. The regulation entitled the Standards for The Protection of Personal Information of Residents of the Commonwealth, requires encryption for stored data as well as the transmission of data. Nevada enacted the nation's first data encryption law effect October 1st, 2008 requiring that all Nevada businesses use encryption when transmitting certain personal information via electronic communications.
Encryption transforms data into an unreadable form as it is transmitted across the Internet. Decryption reverses the process. Encryption and decryption both require a special code or key. For greater protection, consider using the security features in a product like Adobe Acrobat Professional to encrypt or password protect documents. For more on encryption of email, systems and documents see FYI: Playing it Safe With Encryption .
- Nevada Attorneys Beware: New Encryption Law
- Encryption for Lawyers - Jim Calloway's Law Practice Blog links to discussions regarding the Massachusetts law
-Tonya L. Johnson
- For the Health of It
– Computer Accessories December 22, 2008
According to a Wall Street Journal article, Laptops can be a pain in the neck. "Laptops are inherently unergonomic--unless you're 2 feet tall," says physician Norman J. Marcus, a muscle-pain specialist in New York City, quoted in the article. The small size that makes them so popular in our increasingly mobile society is also the characteristic that can make long term use hazardous to your health.
Accessories are the key to minimizing discomfort. While acceptable for short periods of time, a laptop’s built-in display, keyboard and mouse should be supplemented with an external monitor, keyboard and mouse in your primary as well as secondary workspaces. The LTRC discusses how to Increase Your Productivity with Dual Monitors as well as external keyboard and mouse options in Back to Basics: The Best Keyboards and Mice.
- Tonya L. Johnson
- Collaboration Through Microblogging:
Yammer December 22, 2008
Twitter is all the rage these days for attorneys interested in new, cutting-edge methods of connecting with potential clients and developing their reputations within the profession. Attorneys have been particularly attracted by the speed and ease of use of the microblogging tool and the corresponding ease with which others can follow their writing.
Another tool has now emerged that seeks to apply the successful Twitter model to internal communications: Yammer. Like Twitter, Yammer is a microblogging tool designed to allow users to post short messages and to receive messages from others in a chronological "feed" similar to the Twitter feed. Unlike Twitter, however, Yammer removes the strict 140 character limit on posts, offers users the ability to form small groups within the broader user base, allows files to be attached to posts, and -- more importantly -- limits the audience to your coworkers (based on the domain that follows the "@" in your email). Thus, rather than broadcasting to the world, when you use Yammer you are sharing your writing only with your colleagues.
There are numerous potential applications for Yammer. For example, firm-wide Yammer posts could take the place of many non-essential mass emails, eliminating inbox clutter without cutting off firm communications. Practice groups could set up their own Yammer groups to share new cases, important documents, or simply to keep each other updated on their current projects. Yammer's tagging feature could allow attorneys and professional staff across all practice areas or all offices to share information on topics of mutual interest, breaking down traditional communication barriers.
In short, Yammer takes the social networking and communication power of Twitter and applies it to a more professional setting with professional-oriented features. As firms strive to improve efficiency and output, new tools like Yammer merit serious consideration.
- Josh Poje
- To Catch a Thief - Tips and Tools to
Protect Your Computer Investment December 22, 2008
Lawyers are increasingly on the road and utilizing laptop computers. According to the 2008 ABA Legal Technology Survey Report, 43.8% of respondents reported purchasing a laptop computer in the past six months with another 28.1% planning to purchase a laptop computer within the next six months.
While laptops offer attorneys the flexibility to work in the office or to take their work with them wherever they go, this mobility also increases the likelihood of loss or theft. However, you can protect the investment you’ve made in your computer with the latest technologies that can help retrieve your laptop in the event that it is lost or better yet to ensure it does not get away from you in the first place.
Read To Catch a Thief - Tips and Tools to Protect Your Computer Investment for tips and tools to protect your computer investment—data encryption, subscription services, security cables and more. This article was published in YourABA, June 2008.
- Tonya L. Johnson
- Don’t be a statistic; Leave the
Laptop in the Bag December 19, 2008
A research study sponsored by Dell computers suggests that more than 12,000 laptops are lost in U.S. airports each week. Perhaps in response to these distressing numbers, effective Aug. 16, 2008, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) decided to allow laptops to remain in bags that meet "checkpoint friendly" guidelines. TSA encouraged manufacturers to design bags that will produce a clear and unobstructed image of the laptop when undergoing X-ray screening. (Hint: The popular backpack model is not likely to pass muster due to its design). Laptop bags that meet this objective will allow TSA officers a clear, unobstructed view of the laptop and allow passengers to keep the laptop in the bag during screening. The following designs, available at the TSA website, are approved as checkpoint friendly.
While shopping for a "checkpoint friendly" laptop bag check for the following:- Your laptop bag has a designated laptop-only section that you can lay flat on the X-ray belt
- There are no metal snaps, zippers or buckles inside, underneath or on-top of the laptop-only section
- There are no pockets on the inside or outside of the laptop-only section
- There is nothing in the laptop compartment other than the laptop
- You have completely unfolded your bag so that there is nothing above or below the laptop-only section, allowing the bag to lie flat on the X-ray belt
A well designed "checkpoint friendly" bag must be packed appropriately if you intend to leave your laptop in your bag for screening. TSA will only allow laptops to stay in bags through screening if they provide a clear and unobstructed X-ray image of the laptop. While TSA doesn’t certify or endorse any particular bag design or manufacturer, following are some starting points:
Belkin FlyThru Checkpoint Friendly Laptop Case
Targus Zip-Thru laptop bag
The CODi Phantom CT3 – Link includes a video on proper packing
Pathfinder CompuBrief Wheeled Checkpoint Friendly Laptop Case or Briefcase
CNET reviews of Checkpoint Friendly Bags – The good, the bad and the useful
Additional Resources
- 2008 ABA Tech Survey Sees More Mobility
- To catch a thief—tips and tools to protect your computer investment
- Tonya L. Johnson
- Protecting Confidential Data
on Mobile Devices December 17, 2008
News reports emerged this week that reporters who purchased a Blackberry at a firesale of McCain campaign headquarters equipment were able to retrieve sensitive information from the device in the form of copies of McCain campaign e-mails and the private cell phone numbers of numerous important “campaign leaders, politicians, lobbyists and journalists.”
For a lawyer, such important sensitive information stored on mobile devices might include confidential client communications and contact lists. Do you carry around mobile devices such a Blackberry or a laptop computer which contain such confidential law firm and client information? If so, be sure to take steps to protect any confidential information on such devices by using login passwords and encryption so that the contents can’t be accessed by third-parties. When you dispose of such devices be sure to take steps to ensure that the all data is removed from the devices. For more information, see our following resources:
FYI: How to Dispose of your Mobile Phone
FYI: Computer Disposal
FYI: Playing it Safe with Encryption- Stephen Stine
- Practice Management Advisors
- Blog Roundup December 17, 2008
As the year closes, practice management advisors (PMAs) around the country continue to churn out great tech tips and advice on their blogs. Here's a roundup of some of tech-related PMA posts from the last few weeks:
Rodney Dowell, a PMA with the Law Office Management Assistance Program in Massachusetts, featured a guest post on the impact of Massachusetts' new data breach law on solo and small firm attorneys. Rodney followed that up with a post on Encryption for Mac Attorneys.
Oklahoma Bar Association PMA Jim Calloway also discusses the Massachusetts law and Encryption for Lawyers on his Law Practice Tips Blog. Jim also has posts up on Practicing Law with SaaS and how to Get More from Microsoft Outlook.
Erik Mazzone of the North Carolina Bar Association and the Law Practice Matters blog points to a Paperless Law Office Podcast and mentions Legally Minded: New Legal Social Networking Site launched by the ABA.
The State Bar of Wisconsin's PMA, Nerino Petro, offers a simple step-by-step guide to creating duplicate records in MS Outlook and other MS Office products.
From the Law Society of British Columbia, PMA David Bilinsky offers his nominations for the 2008 Canadian Legal Blog Awards and points to some good commentary on Web 2.0.
Want more? You can stay up to date on the latest posts from practice management experts around the web by subscribing to our PMA Pipe RSS feed.
- Josh Poje
- LTRC Site to Check Out December
01, 2008
If you are trying to de-clutter in preparation for the holidays, earth911.com is a site you'll want to visit. Just tell them what you have and where you are and Earth911.com will list nearby locations that will accept your items for recycling. Since 1991, Earth911 and 1-800-CLEANUP have provided access to data for more than 74,000 locations for recycling, household hazardous waste disposal, reuse, and listings for more than 400,000 services.
- Tonya L. Johnson
- Mark Your Calendars! - ABA TECHSHOW
2009 December 01, 2008
ABA TECHSHOW 2009 presented by the ABA Law Practice Management Section, takes place April 2-4, 2009, at the Hilton Chicago hotel. ABA TECHSHOW highlights include:
- More Than 60 Educational Sessions
- Two-day Expo Featuring Over 100 Vendors
- Thursday's ABA TECHSHOW® After Dark Reception
- Friday is Solo/Small Firm Day
- Taste of ABA TECHSHOW®
- Product Demonstration Sessions
- Complimentary WiFi Access
- CLE Credit Available
- Group/Law Firm Discounts
- Conference Concierge and Tech Help Desk
This year's featured keynote speaker, legal futurist Richard Susskind, is author of the newly released title "The End of Lawyers? Rethinking the Nature of Legal Services". Take advantage of the world's premier legal technology Continuing Legal Education conference and expo at a substantial discount by registering before the early bird registration deadline of by Feb 28, 2009.
- Tonya L. Johnson
- New from LTRC: Blog Provider
Comparison Chart November 25, 2008
Many lawyers have neither the time nor the inclination to immerse themselves in the technical details of setting up a blog from scratch -- finding a host, downloading and installing the blog software, tweaking everything until it's just right, and so forth. For those attorneys, setting up a blog through a dedicated blog provider is the best solution. In a matter of minutes, a lawyer can set up a new blog through one of the major service providers by entering little more than a blog name and their email address. Once the blog is set up, a broad range of features and customizable options present themselves.
But what blog provider is right for you? We've tried to take some of the stress out of that decision by putting together a simple comparison chart of the major features (and costs) of each of the big three blog providers -- Blogger, Wordpress and Typepad. You can check out the chart here: FYI: Feature Comparison - Major Blog Providers.
Read more about blogging from the LTRC:
- Josh Poje
- New LTRC Article Roundup
November 25, 2008
Check out our new legal technology articles by the LTRC staff via the LTRC articles page, including:
2008 ABA Tech Survey Sees More Mobility (Law.com)
The 2008 ABA Legal Technology Survey Report suggests that an increasing number of attorneys have found a way to bridge the "work/life" gap: they're going mobile. The report is the latest from the American Bar Association's Legal Technology Resource Center, which has surveyed practicing attorneys for more than a decade.
Three Internet scams and solutions lawyers should know about (YourABA)
Some online scammers have specifically targeted lawyers, leaving them on the hook for hundreds of thousands of dollars, potentially ruining their practices and livelihoods, and in one case prompting a bank to sue the lawyer. Here are three noteworthy types of online threats to look out for and corresponding solutions.
Portable Scanners: Primer and Comparison (ABA Family Law eNewsletter)
If you're visiting clients off-site, your portable scanner gives you the ability to make a record of key documents on the spot. Most portable scanners have the ability to scan documents ranging in size from a business card to a legal document or 14" in length and come bundled with value added software.
- Stephen Stine
- Practice Management Advisors
- Blog Roundup November 25, 2008
As usual, the practice management advisors (PMAs) and legal technology consultants around the web have been posting a wide variety of useful and practical advice on their blogs. Here are some of their recent posts you may want to check out:
Jim Calloway from the Oklahoma Bar Association offers a very helpful article on the Ethics of Metadata 2008, and also points to Carolyn Elefant's mindmap of the process of starting a new firm.
Reid Trautz presents his timely and much anticipated 2008 Holiday Gift Guide for Lawyers. Reid also offers some advice on Increasing Office Productivity & Security, and takes a look at the possible replacement for Microsoft Vista.
David Bilinsky continues his series of "I'm A Mac" posts following his platform switch, this time providing a very useful workaround for an obnoxious PowerPoint conversion issue.
And finally, Erik Mazzone of the North Carolina Bar Association posts an interesting list of six Things You Didn't Know You Could Do in Word.
Want more? You can stay up to date on the latest posts from practice management experts around the web by subscribing to our PMA Pipe RSS feed.
- Josh Poje
- Technology Giving For the Holidays
November 24, 2008
While considering holiday giving, remember to add your practice to the list of recipients. Many organizations look to balance the budget at the end of the year with equipment purchases. The government has made provisions that may make necessary purchases of computers and computer software (off the shelf) purchased and put into use between January 1, 2008 and December 31, 2008 more attractive. Visit the IRS website and Section179.org for more information.
Once you have your wish list handy, visit ABA Member Advantage to take advantage of the great deals available to ABA members. Get special promotions and discounts on HP and Toshiba as well as Preferred Level pricing on the complete line of Xerox products. Additionally, we’ve just begun a new partnership with i365 (formerly eVault) to meet your data security and compliance requirements.
Charitable donation alert: The One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) organization has resumed its Give One, Get One Laptop promotion for 2008. The program, first launched in 2007, helped raise more than $35 million for laptops in developing nations. Customers can purchase a machine through Amazon for $399 and donate a second to a needy child.
Additional Resources
- Time
& Billing Solutions for Mac Users November 24, 2008
Timeslips, a popular time and billing application amongst lawyers, discontinued its Macintosh version in 2002. However, when Apple switched to an Intel processor in 2005, this opened the door to running windows based applications, including TimeSlips, on a Macintosh utilizing Apple's Boot Camp, Parallels, or similar programs. During the interim, a number of vendors stepped in to fill the void, developing time and billing applications specifically for the Macintosh operating system. Following are time and billing applications and web based solutions designed for Macintosh.
-Tonya Johnson
Applications
EasyTime - Law Edition by Bright Light Software handles time tracking and billing.
Billings by Marketcircle, while not designed specifically for the legal industry, is a time and billing software that is popular among Mac users and allows users to track time and manage expenses.
Brief Time & Billing, a Brief Legal Software product, utilizes the Brief EnCounter module for slip entry. A license is required for each timekeeper.
Web Based or Hosted Solutions also known as SaaS (Software as a Service)
Bill4Time is a hosted time- and expense-tracking and billing application that offers project management and scheduling functions. There is also an accompanying mobile application called Bill4Time Mobile.
Integrated programs (include billing as a feature of a practice or case management application)
LawStream Pro – a timekeeping, billing and accounting software application.
Rocket Matter – Web based practice Management application designed specifically for the legal profession.
Additional Resources:
How Lawyers Practice Law and Serve Clients with Macs - Really! – ABA Law Practice Today September 2008
Mac Wares for the Jurisprudence Crowd - By Erika Morphy for MacNewsWorld 07/24/08
Time & Billing Software for Macs by Ben Stevens author of the MacLawyer blog
Macintosh Legal Office Tools listed on the apple website.
FYI: Macintel – An LTRC article regarding the Macintosh and Intel processor
-Tonya JohnsonMacLaw · Yahoo! Email list for lawyers & other Mac users (Free registration required)
- What’s Twitter Good
For? An Introduction to Twitter Post Searching November 21, 2008
Have you ever gone to a website or used a web application and thought, “What would I use this for?” Search functionality on a website is often a first measure of usefulness for many users—“Can I find useful information that I’m looking for on this site or with this application?” Oddly enough, the “microblogging” site Twitter seems to have overlooked this phenomenon—if you navigate to the main Twitter page at twitter.com, you won’t see a search box anywhere on the page, not front and center nor displayed prominently at the top of the screen like on most other popular websites today.
Twitter has buried their search box that lets you search through Twitter posts on another page, accessible via a link at the bottom of the main Twitter page. So if you’ve ever visited Twitter and wondered what the fuss is about, click on the “Search” link at the bottom of the main page or navigate directly to http://search.twitter.com/ and enter search terms just as you would with Google or Yahoo and see what information comes up. Enter terms such as “class action,” “legal technology,” “legal research,” or any other search terms that might interest you, and a number of relevant results will be returned if anyone has written Twitter posts on the topic--quite a few posts (“Tweets”) were returned for the search terms listed above.
Best of all, you can subscribe to search results for a search query via an RSS feed—you don’t even have to sign up for a Twitter account to receive up-to-date and relevant Twitter posts. Whenever you perform a search on the Twitter Search page, at the top right of the search results page will be a link with the text “Feed for this query” next to an RSS icon. Click on the link in order to subscribe to the search query via an RSS feed—you will be notified of all future public Tweets containing your search terms via your RSS feed reader.
This has great research and current awareness potential—you won’t have to hunt around and “follow”/subscribe to every individual Twitter poster you think might post on topics you’re interested in, rather you can be alerted to all relevant public Tweets from all posters via RSS, without even needing a Twitter account at all. (You can also subscribe to RSS feeds for individual Twitter posters, such as the LTRC). So, if you’re not quite sure how Twitter might be useful to you, try out the Twitter Search and “Feed for this query” features--you just might find up-to-date information on topics that interest you. Of course, that’s just the tip of the iceberg—see our recent Site-tation post Lawyers and Twitter for more information on the use of Twitter in the practice of law.
Other resources:
- New Wireless Internet
Security Threat, Switch to WPA2 Encryption November 14, 2008
Lawyers using wireless internet access should make sure that the connections are secured with WPA2 and not WEP or WPA encryption, in addition to possibly taking other precautionary measures such as using a VPN to connect to your office network. In a recent development in wireless internet security, researchers have developed a method of breaking WPA wireless internet access encryption, enabling snooping on wireless internet traffic. Wireless internet users were advised to switch from WEP to WPA or WPA2 wireless internet encryption in 2007; WEP is considered very insecure and reportedly can be breached in minutes.
However, with this newest development, technology research and advisory firm Gartner recommends “Wherever possible, migrate WLANs [Wireless Local Area Networks] from WPA to WPA2.” Wireless internet connections should always be encrypted to prevent others from snooping on your internet traffic, which could reveal information including but not limited to the contents of e-mail messages and attachments, usernames and passwords, and credit card information.
Other resources:
ABA Site-tation: Lawyers and Twitter
ABA LTRC: The ABA LTRC on Twitter
ABA Journal: The ABA Journal on Twitter
Search Engine Journal: How To Search Twitter--The Advanced Guide
-Stephen Stine
PC World.com
Once Thought Safe, WPA Wi-Fi Encryption Is Cracked
ABA Law Practice Magazine:
The Wonders and Worries of Wireless: Seven Steps to Being Secure
-Stephen Stine
- Improve Your Law Firm
Website Search Engine Rankings: Introducing the Official Google Search Engine
Optimization Starter Guide November 14, 2008
Creating a website for your law firm is a great way to get the word out about the services your firm offers. Where your website ranks in search engine results for searches on relevant terms is a major consideration in driving traffic to your site. For years, practitioners of “Search Engine Optimization” have offered their paid services, claiming to help owners of websites improve their sites’ search rankings, with varying degrees of success. The most prized objective is increasing search rankings in Google search results, as Google is the #1 search engine on the Internet; however, Google is notoriously secret about how exactly its search algorithms rank sites, and SEO efforts targeting Google search results have always been more art than science.
After years of casting a wary eye on the promises of SEO practitioners (“Deciding to hire an SEO is a big decision that can potentially improve your site and save time, but you can also risk damage to your site and reputation. Make sure to research the potential advantages as well as the damage that an irresponsible SEO can do to your site.”), Google has released its own official “Search Engine Optimization Starter Guide.” This guide won’t reveal any sought after Google SEO secret tricks to automatically make your site the number one hit for all searches, but covers quite a number of aspects of website creation that can help Google find and categorize your site, making it easier for users to find.
The guide covers issues such as best practices for using html tags, tips on content, metadata, possible ways to promote your website, and pointers on free webmaster tools including web analytics services. The document features short explanations and bulleted lists of best practices and practices to avoid. With twenty-two pages of tips, this official guide is worth looking through for anyone interested in optimizing their website rankings in Google search results.
Other resources:
Official Google Webmaster Central Blog:
Google's SEO Starter Guide
ABA Site-tation:
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) for Lawyers' Websites-Stephen Stine
- Can You Peek? The Ethics
of Mining Metadata October 28, 2008
Metadata is often defined as "data about data." Put differently, "metadata" refers to the layer of hidden information within nearly all electronic files that details the files' origins and history: who created it, what software was used, how recently it was edited, what changes or comments may have been made, and so forth. Metadata has become a significant issue within the legal profession due to the numerous and varied documents lawyers draft and receive -- from demand letters to contracts to appellate briefs -- and the increasing frequency with which these documents are transmitted electronically.
In a recent article for the New York Law Journal (reproduced on Law.com), attorney Norman C. Simon discusses the current ethical landscape with regard to one specific metadata issue: whether or not attorneys are ethically prohibited from reviewing (or "mining") the metadata contained in the electronic documents they receive from opposing counsel. Simon examines the New York approach as well as conflicting views from other bar associations around th country, and concludes with advice for attorneys who may be wrestling with the issue in their own practices.
Read the article: Coming to Terms on Mining Metadata.
If you'd like to know exactly what bar associations around the country have concluded with regard to metadata, you can visit our new metadata ethics opinion comparison chart. We look at what each ethics committee has said about the sender's duty, the recipient's ability to mine for metadata, and any notification requirement imposed on the recipient.
- Josh Poje
- Protect Your Firm Data
From Pre-Vista Security Flaw October 25, 2008
Scenario (applies to pre-Vista Windows computers): you or your IT person have set up your computer so that you can log in using a username and a password. You might think that this means that no one else, other than the IT people perhaps, can access the files on your computer without your password, short of physically removing your hard drive and sticking it into another computer (file encryption, if used, could prevent file access in such a scenario).
However, you could be wrong. Depending on how your computer was set up, your computer might have an all-powerful administrator account accessible with no password required, with which anyone could access the contents and functionality of your entire computer. How can you tell? (You might want to contact your IT person to try the following steps). Restart your computer—do you have the option to enter a username and a password after your computer reboots? If you don’t have the option to enter a username, such as if you are presented with a “Welcome” screen with your username printed on the screen and just the option to enter a password, pressing ctrl-alt-delete twice in a row may bring up a screen in which you can enter both a username and password. (In Windows XP Home, you will have to enter “safe mode” to access the administrator account). Now, enter “administrator” as the username and leave the password field blank. Did Windows log you in?
If you were logged in, this is because many versions of pre-Vista Windows operating systems create an administrator account on your computer with a default blank password when the operating system is installed. So if no one intentionally set a password for this administrator account, anyone typing in “administrator” as the username and leaving the password field blank will be able to access all of the files and functionality on your computer. This may be counterintuitive to you, especially if you usually login with your own username and password and thought that no one could access your files without using your username and password.
This is considered to be a security issue, and thus in Windows Vista such administrator accounts are disabled by default. In Microsoft’s own words, “In previous versions of Windows, an Administrator account was automatically created during Out-of-Box-Experience (OOBE) with a blank password. An Administrator account with a blank password is a security risk. To better protect the system, the built-in Administrator account is disabled by default in all clean installations and upgrades of Windows Vista.”
However, if you are running a pre-Vista Windows computer it might have a blank-password administrator account accessible. Check with your go-to IT person to see if such a potential security issue may exist, as you wouldn’t want anyone strolling around your office, or finding your laptop if you lose it, to be able to easily access all your files and computer functionality without needing a password. That could put your confidential client and law firm data at risk.
Other resources:
ABA Family Law eNewsletter
What's the Password?ABA Journal
Power PasswordsMicrosoft.com
What's the difference between Administrator and Limited User accounts?ABA LTRC
FYI: Playing it Safe with Encryption-Stephen Stine
Earlier posts
