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Social Networking: Legal Ethics and Lawyer Liability Considerations
May 19, 2015Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, MySpace: these and other social networking tools on the Internet are being used by people in all walks of life-including lawyers. This article will analyze the potential ethical issues that can occur in lawyer use of social networking. Most of the issues are variations on old themes, Read the full post
Check Frauds on Lawyers
May 19, 2015by Jett Hanna Update January 4, 2016: Check frauds such as these continue to fool Texas lawyers. Last week, we had a fraud and a narrowly avoided fraud reported to us. One of the frauds involved a name reported online here. There have been a number of reports over the Read the full post
Unsolicited Email and Obligations of Confidentiality
May 19, 2015By Jett Hanna Establishment of an attorney client relationship has always been a difficult issue at the margins. Texas law holds that a lawyer has a duty to warn a non-client that they are not a client if it is reasonable for the person to assume that they are the client. Parker Read the full post
Malpractice and Ethical Risks in Cloud Computing
May 19, 2015Cloud computing, which is the use of a remote vendor connected by the internet for computing needs, isn’t a futuristic concept. It is here today. In most cases, you use the browser on your local computer to interact with the remote program. The use of cloud computing by lawyers and Read the full post
The Risk of Data Breaches in Law Firms
May 19, 2015by Jett Hanna A lawyer produces information containing personally identifiable information about a client’s employees to another law firm. One of the lawyers at the other law firm downloads a copy of that file and stores it, unencrypted, on their laptop. The laptop is then stolen at the airport. Does Read the full post
Can You Pay Credit Card and PayPal Fees From Trust Accounts?
May 19, 2015Lawyers increasingly accept credit cards and other payment services such as Paypal and Square for payment of fees. Lawyers pay for these services through a combination of per transaction and percentage of the transaction fees. When the funds advanced by the client pay the lawyer for fees already earned, credit Read the full post
New HIPAA Regulations And Texas Laws Create Data Security Obligations For Lawyers
May 19, 2015New federal health care regulations and state law have made data security for lawyers to whom these rules apply a matter requiring new attention. by Jett Hanna Regulations under HIPAA (the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) promulgated by the federal Health and Human Services Department, and effective on September Read the full post
Lawyer Admits Computer Illiteracy, Gets Sanctioned
January 30, 2015From a sanctions opinion in New Jersey: National’s counsel offered a different explanation (for failing to update a spreadsheet): “I have to confess to this Court, I am not computer literate. I have not found presence in the cybernetic revolution. I need a secretary to help me turn on the Read the full post