The Fulton County Daily Report's "The Snark" has illustrated, in a tounge-in-cheek manner, what has indisputably been the biggest change in the practice of law--including criminal law--over the decade just passed--technology. We have noted on this blog before that the technology boom of the last ten and more years has also presented inventive new avenues for crime and has created unusual challenges to the impartiality and sanctity of jury trials.
To be sure, e-mail had become widespread in the legal community by the late 1990s. However, as the comment notes, during the 2000s attorneys truly came into the full realization of the potential for e-mail as a more reliable and permanent way to document interactions between parties. The other edge of the sword is, of course, e-mail's evidentiary potential which can come back to haunt clients in various unpleasant ways. Few indeed are the defense attorneys who have not had at least one case where a client's computer was seized and imaged by the government, only to have e-mails alleged to be incriminating returned as highlights in government reciprocal discovery. While the positive side of e-mail is that it has made communication easy and easily preserved, the negative side of e-mail is... that it has made communication easy and easily preserved. E-mail is forever, and savvy 21st century lawyers would do well to counsel clients to be mindful not only of what they say, but of what they type and (increasingly in the decade ahead) of what they "text."
The comment also notes the changes in practice wrought by two other trends which began in the 90s: the continued spread of computer-assisted legal research and the growth of electronic filing. The need to page through compendious reporter volumes and indexes, or to spend hours at the local law library, has become an increasing rarity. Likewise, attorneys are increasingly relieved of the pressure to race to the courthouse before the clerk's office closes in order to file with the adoption of electronic case filing by more and more courts. The Blog notes that Case Management/Electronic Case Filing "CM/ECF," "PACER", a veritable blessing to both Federal courts and attorneys practicing in them, was first implemented by the Northern District of Ohio in 1996, and today is used by all Federal courts, a development which has heroically saved numerous acres of trees, millions in postage and reliance on the vagaries of the mails for reciept of notice of filings.
We close, fittingly, with a reminder of the challenges that the growth of technology will continue to pose for law and criminal enforcement. Ashby Jones at the Wall Street Journal Law Blog reports that the Los Angeles firm of Gibson Hoffman & Pancione has alleged that a cyber-attack originating in the People's Republic of China. The firm has alleged that its software code has been stolen by malicious e-mails which appeared to be sent by other members of the firm, and which contained a "Trojan" code enabling the takeover of the firm's computers. The firm coincidentally represents the California-based company CYBERsitter in a $2.2 billion lawsuit against China, alleging that filtering programs used by China contain over 3,000 lines of code illegally taken from content filtering software produced by CYBERsitter. The FBI is investigating the attack.
