5 Technology Traps That Can Ruin Your Law Practice

With tech complexity shooting skyward, even pretty well educated folk like lawyers have to watch their steps carefully when it comes to security slip-ups. Any one of the scenarios we list below could completely ruin your practice and your business for a long time -- yet lawyers still do them every day.

Just accept that tech problems will take place. However, you can and should take steps to mitigate how often they take place. A little prep will save much headache down the road.

1. Opening That Unknown Attachment

This is a common one that gets people all the time. Remember Heartbleed? And lawyers are particularly susceptible to fake-attachment attacks because they get tons of email everyday.

Take the extra 10 seconds to scan your emails and to see if you recognize the sender. If not, don't chance it. If you really want to know what that person sent, contact them yourself.

2. Leaving Your Mobile Device in Public Spaces

This very common occurrence has been happening more and more often these days, most famously when a former Apple employee left an iPhone 5 prototype in a bar. If you're not lucky, it could end up on the black market and all of your clients' info could end up in the hands of Russian hackers or worse.

3. Using Public WiFi

It's tempting to use public WiFi, but as far as we're concerned, this is the security equivalent of driving high speeds without wearing your seat belt. There are ways to up your security game using public WiFi through VPNs, but if don't have to, why bother taking the risk?

4. Letting Someone Remote Desktop Your PC

How many of you use remote desktop? No problem if you trust the network and the person on the other side. But what if you don't know that person from Adam? It's a tremendously risky thing to allow a third party to fix your computer remotely. If you're really unlucky, you could have a front-row seat to some hacker going into your client info and personal unmentionables while you look on helplessly.

5. Storing Everything on the Cloud Without Backing Up

It's almost a given that the masses want to go to the cloud. But old codgers in computing know that this could be a dangerous gamble. You want to frequently back up your client files to physical drives you have on location -- ones that are disconnected from the network when not in use. In practice, two drives are best. These days, even USB keys are acceptable.

Related Resources:

• 7 Cybersecurity Tips For Lawyers (Above the Law)
• Bitcoin Is Not Money According to Florida Judge (FindLaw's Technologist)
• KickassTorrents Owner Indicted for IP Law Violations (FindLaw's Technologist)
• Should Lawyers Bother With Instagram? (FindLaw's Technologist)