Special Committee Virginia State
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Virginia State Bar Special Committee THE FUTURE OF LAW PRACTICE 2019 2 Virginia State Bar l Future of Law Practice Committee ©2019 1 1 INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................................2 TECHNOLOGY AND THE PRACTICE OF LAW .................................................4 2.1 Cybersecurity ......................................................................................................................................................................5 2.2 Current Cybersecurity Statistics .......................................................................................................................................5 2.3 Cyberinsurance and the Morphing of Threats ................................................................................................................7 2 2.4 Cybersecurity Standards ...................................................................................................................................................8 2.5 Data Loss Through Employees .........................................................................................................................................9 2.6 Why are Law Firms So Far Behind in Cybersecurity? ..................................................................................................10 2.7 Encryption ..........................................................................................................................................................................10 2.8 Cloud Computing as a Solution to Data Security Concerns ........................................................................................11 2.8.1 Cloud Computing Benefits ...................................................................................................................................11 2.8.2 Cloud Computing Data Security Issues ..............................................................................................................12 2.9 The European Union’s General Data Protection Act ....................................................................................................13 2.10 ABA Issues New Ethics Opinion on the Duties of Lawyers Following a Disaster .................................................14 2.11 ABA Issues New Ethics Opinion on Ethical Duties Following a Data Breach or Cyberattack .............................15 2.12 Microsoft Introduces Secure Score .............................................................................................................................15 2.13 Artificial Intelligence Comes of Age .............................................................................................................................16 2.13.1 AI and Human Bias .............................................................................................................................................16 2.13.2 The Legal Sector’s Role in Artificial Intelligence ............................................................................................18 2.14 Blockchain: Powering more than Cryptocurrencies ..................................................................................................19 2.14.1 The Advent of Cryptocurrencies .......................................................................................................................19 2.14.2 Blockchain and Distributed Ledger Technology .............................................................................................20 2.14.3 Are Blockchains Really Hack-Proof? ................................................................................................................21 2.14.4 Applications and Implications for Lawyers .....................................................................................................22 ACCESS TO JUSTICE ................................................................................ 24 3.1. Attorney-Assisted Pro Se Litigation and Unbundled Services .................................................................................26 3.1.1 Limited Scope Representation ............................................................................................................................26 3.1.2 Ghostwriting ..........................................................................................................................................................26 3 3.2. Pro Bono Service Reporting ..........................................................................................................................................27 3.3. Amendments to Emeritus Rule to Promote Pro Bono Services ..............................................................................28 3.4. Law Firm Role in Closing the Access to Justice Gap ..................................................................................................28 3.5. Utah to License NonLawyers to Practice Law in Limited Circumstances ...............................................................28 ALTERNATIVE BUSINESS STRUCTURES .................................................... 29 4.1. Alternative Legal Service Providers .............................................................................................................................30 4 4.2. Ethical Implications of Nonlawyer Legal Service Providers .....................................................................................31 ATTORNEY WELL-BEING .......................................................................... 35 5.1. Report of the National Task Force on Lawyer Well-Being ........................................................................................36 5.2. Report of the Committee on Lawyer Well-Being of the Supreme Court of Virginia .............................................36 5 5.3. VSB President’s Special Committee on Lawyer Well-Being ....................................................................................37 5.4. Other Changes Within the Virginia State Bar .............................................................................................................37 6 RECOMMENDATIONS ............................................................................... 39 2 INTRODUCTION The VSB Special Committee on the Future of Law Practice was charged in 2014 with evaluating current developments in the legal landscape and assessing how these changes will impact the practice of law. In 2016, we issued our first report to the VSB along with a set of recommendations. To say that the pace of change in the practice of law has accelerated is an understatement. As with the first report, we hope to illuminate the changing landscape of the practice of law both to help educate lawyers and to help prepare them for a continually morphing future. Even the early drafts of this report had to be edited to account for additional changes as we were writing. Committee members have undertaken to meet regularly and work on a continuing basis to read everything we can find on the future of law practice - articles, ethics opinions, studies by other bar associations – the list goes on and on. We previously identified a number of external forces affecting the practice of law: 1) advances in technology that have changed the way lawyers practice, giving clients the expectation that lawyers will provide services more efficiently and cheaply, and giving consumers the belief that they can obtain legal information and handle many legal matters on their own; 2) increasing competition from nonlawyers service providers that offer legal information and legal documents to consumers; 3) generational pressures that are likely to impact law firm business models – estimates are that 70% of law firm partners are baby boomers, while millennials are expected to make up half the global workforce in the next two years; 4) clients’ dissatisfaction with billable hour arrangements encouraging lawyers to offer fixed fees and other alternative billing arrangements; 5) increased insourcing of legal services by corporate clients, along with increased unbundling of tasks so that lawyers are only asked to complete the specific tasks that require legal judgment; and 6) accelerated globalization of legal services via both traditional models and technology, leading to an increase in multijurisdictional law practice and a decreasing relevance of geographical boundaries. Recently, we have added artificial intelligence, blockchain and cryptocurrencies to the forces that are impacting the practice of law. 3 Additionally, the profession has taken on a focus of well-being for the legal community. subcommittees The committee is divided into three subcommittees: TECHNOLOGY AND THE PRACTICE OF LAW ACCESS TO JUSTICE ALTERNATIVE BUSINESS STRUCTURES This subcommittee looked at This subcommittee focused on This subcommittee looked at advances in technology and the “justice gap” — the unmet jurisdictions outside the U.S. how new technologies are legal needs of a large majority that permit nonlawyers to changing law practice. It also of our low and middle-income participate and have ownership studied how the internet and population despite an over- in legal services firms, as well other forces have created a supply of lawyers in the U.S. as the status of any similar market for nonlawyer legal It also focused attention on initiatives or proposals in U.S. service providers. initiatives by the organized bar jurisdictions. and the efforts of other orga- nizations to address the justice gap, including some projects in other