Blog

October is Cybersecurity Month in the United States, but with the increasing rates of cybercrime, both from international and domestic sources, there is no month where cybercrime isn’t a constant, potentially catastrophic threat. The SolarWinds attack attributed to Russia in 2020, recent attacks on the water supply and other national infrastructure, and the increasing rate at which people have started working from home after the pandemic, has increased our awareness of cybercrime and our need to be constantly vigilant.

One consistent message that seems to resonate from legislature to legislature across the world is the recognition of the fact that data - especially personal data - is both a weapon and a vulnerability, and in the quickly-evolving digital landscape of today the task of safeguarding it effectively becomes more and more difficult. The Australian legislature seeks to update its current privacy laws, which are based on both the original 1988 Privacy Act, and its later update from 2000, to reflect the rapid technological advancements that took place in the early 21st century in data collection, data storage and data analysis.

Cloud Computing, or the ability to use software and data storage over the internet rather than on a local physical device, has greatly increased over the past several years, skyrocketed during the pandemic, and is predicted to continue growing into 2022.

Technology Assisted Review (often shortened to TAR) has been making inroads in most major litigation markets. The progress hasn't been as speedy as some would have liked, perhaps, but law is a cautious and conservative field and even technological advancements that promise to herald a new era of efficiency in legal discovery and document review must wait until sufficient precedent has been accumulated by those daring justices and judges who are willing to give technology a chance.

Global technology competition has grown fierce recently requiring nations to consider and enact technology protection policies and strategies. In Japan, for example, there was a significant change in 2014 under the Liberal Democratic Party that led to the development and passage of the Economic Security Promotion Act in 2022, along with a new National Security Strategy.

The legal industry is undergoing transformational changes as aspects of information governance and eDiscovery are refined with new data governance solutions and technologies to address evolving business and regulatory requirements.

Artificial Intelligence is a way of using technology to analyze large amounts of data in much less time than it would take a human user, and to make predictions based on this data that can be helpful for a variety of applications. Deep Blue’s legendary chess match against Kasparov is a classic example of AI and its ability to predict certain outcomes based on data.

Cyberattacks that use AI are currently rare and limited to social engineering applications, (such as impersonating an individual) or used in ways that aren’t directly observable by researchers and analysts. However, the quantity and quality of advances in AI have made more advanced cyberattacks likely in the foreseeable future.