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Sensei Officers Featured in North Carolina Enewsletter

May 14, 2020

Sensei’s Sharon Nelson and John Simek were highlighted in a recent North Carolina enewsletter article “ Video Conferencing – You Have Options” by Catherine Sanders Reach. The North Carolina Bar enewsletter, which brings a weekly wrap-up of legal tech and practice management tips, breaking news and useful information.

 Excerpt:

During a time of social distancing law firms, courts, schools, and more are now meeting via video conference. Zoom rapidly became the platform of choice due to its low price point and ease of use. However, Zoom has been besieged with security issues, many of which are being rapidly addressed. There are still ways to use Zoom securely, and there are also plenty of options lawyers can consider for their video conferencing needs.

In Comment [19] to NC RPC 1.6, lawyers are given some guidance as to how to determine if they have made reasonable efforts to prevent access or disclosure of confidential client information. The factors include the sensitivity of the information, the likelihood of disclosure if additional safeguards are not employed, the cost of employing additional safeguards, the difficulty of implementing the safeguards, and the extent to which the safeguards adversely affect the lawyer’s ability to represent clients. Taking those factors into consideration, lawyers can weigh the pros and cons of various video conferencing platforms.

The Elephant in the Room

 Zoom’s video conferencing platform quickly became the video conferencing platform du jour for lawyers and the rest of the world. Why? It is free or inexpensive, dead simple to use and works well on almost any device, browser, or operating system. Zoom integrates with Office 365, Slack, G-Suite, Calendly and many other applications.

Zoom’s popularity also meant that its security protocols (or lack thereof) came under intense scrutiny. From server traffic routing through China to an overly broad privacy policy to weak encryption, there is plenty of work for Zoom to do to improve their security. And they are working to address those things. Other security concerns stem from their huge user base and high profile. Hackers and bad actors looked for exploits and the results were stolen login credentials, Zoom bombing, wardriving for open Zoom meetings, zero-day exploits and more. Tom’s Guide documents all the Zoom security issues, as well as what has been fixed. Although Zoom has dedicated the next 90 days to begin addressing the security issues and has made several fixes, Google and Tesla both banned the use of Zoom for work.

There are a few noted legal technologists who have made the argument that, used effectively, Zoom can be used for secure communication. Simon Boehme and John Grant write that Zoom is Safe for Lawyers (if you use it right), John Simek from Sensei Enterprises also suggests the same – Zoom can be used by lawyers if appropriate safeguards are followed, and Sharon Nelson follows with “Lawyers: Don’t be Afraid to Use Zoom”.

Read the entire article here.