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Industry Trends

This Study Says Two-Thirds of Law Firms Still Have No Staff Devoted to Information Security: eDiscovery Trends

Not surprisingly, a major “hot” topic at ILTACON earlier this month was cybersecurity.  Stories about data hacks are abundant, with recent notable hacks including this one and this one, and you may not even know if the law firm holding your data has ever suffered a breach.  A new study, introduced at ILTACON earlier this month, aims to shed light on security assessment practices of legal organizations in North America.

The 2015 Study of the Legal Industry’s Information Security Assessment Practices was developed by Digital Defense Inc. (DDI), in collaboration with ILTA’s LegalSEC Steering Committee.  It aims to help law firms evaluate their individual information security practices, as well as to examine the state of security in the legal profession as a whole.

There were over 150 participants in the study, with Chief Information Officers and IT Managers collectively accounting for 63% of those participants.  Of the firms that participated, 83% identified the top area of practice as Litigation, followed closely by Corporate, Labor & Employment, and Real Estate, all over 70%.

Some key findings of the report include:

  • 66% of organizations surveyed have no staff devoted to Information Security;
  • Employee Negligence and Phishing/Vishing Attacks rank as the highest information security concerns within firms;
  • Many organizations are performing services to combat employee negligence, with 78% performing Information Security training for employees;
  • Approximately 70% of respondents conduct Vulnerability Scanning assessments and Penetration tests, a significant increase (15-20%) from 2014;
  • However, 63% of respondents do not have a Vendor Management Evaluation process in place.

The 24-page study includes: 1) a breakdown of participants (in terms of title, practice areas, firm size and geographic representation), 2) information on firms’ information security programs (including strategy, budget allocations and resource management), 3) information security concerns and products/services used to address those concerns, 4) information security standards, policies and training programs and even 5) a glossary of terms (do you know what “vishing” is?  I didn’t).

You can download a free copy of the study here.  For more information about ILTA’s LegalSEC initiative, click here.

So, what do you think?  Are you surprised by any of the study results?   Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscovery Daily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Daily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

Legal Salaries on the Rise? That’s the Half of It: eDiscovery Trends

Robert Half, that is.

Robert Half’s 2016 Legal Salary Guide features salary ranges for more than 100 positions in the legal field and provides some other interesting statistics, as well.  According to the Guide, average starting salaries for lawyers at law firms are expected to increase 3.5 percent in 2016.  And, salaries for experienced litigation support and eDiscovery directors and managers are expected to rise even more than that.

The salary figures in the 2016 edition are based on a number of sources, most notably the thousands of full-time, temporary and project placements Robert Half’s staffing and recruiting professionals make each year. Here are some breakdowns:

  • Lawyers: Starting salaries for lawyers with 10-plus years’ experience are expected to increase 0 to 4.7 percent from 2015 (depending on the size of the firm). A lawyer with 10-plus years’ experience at a large firm (75+ lawyers) is expected to hit an average range of $194,250 to $279,500 annually.  First-year associates’ salaries are expected to increase 2.2 to 2.7 percent increase over 2015 projections.  Corporate in house counsel are expected to see average compensation gains of 2.2 to 3.7 percent over 2015 levels, with the more experienced in house counsel trending toward the top end of that range (average range of $185,250 to $259,750 annually).
  • Paralegals/Legal Assistants: Starting salaries for paralegals/legal assistants are expected to increase 0 to 4.0 percent from 2015. Senior legal assistants with 7+ years of experience are expected to make as much as $96,750 annually at large law firms.
  • Litigation Support/eDiscovery: Starting salaries for litigation support/eDiscovery directors and managers are expected to increase from 4 to 5.7 percent annually from 2015. The top end of the salary range for litigation support/eDiscovery directors with 10+ years of experience is $130,500.  Document coders also see an increase – 3.6 percent over 2015.

The guide also provides salary expectations for office managers, legal secretaries, legal specialists and contract and compliance administration positions for both law firms and corporate legal.  Not surprisingly, they’re all up.

Other notable statistics:

  • Lawyers’ top responses to the question “Aside from compensation or bonus, which of the following provides the best incentive for legal professionals to remain with a law firm/ company?” were as follows: Challenging work or variety of assignments (39 percent), Professional development opportunities (26 percent), Flexible work arrangements (20 percent).
  • 71 percent of lawyers said blended or hybrid paralegal/legal secretary positions are more common today than they were two years ago.
  • The top two practice areas that are expected to generate the greatest number of legal jobs in the next two years in the US are: Litigation (33 percent) and General Business/Commercial Law (26 percent).

The survey guide also provides an adjustment for various US cities across the country (obviously, salaries are much higher in New York (140 percent of the reported numbers for the different positions) than in Duluth, MN (79.6 percent).  For example, the top end of the salary range for litigation support/eDiscovery directors with 10+ years of experience in Houston (107.5 percent for my hometown) is actually $140,287 (just sayin’).  So, you can adjust the numbers based on local variances.  The guide even has a Canada section, eh?

The FREE 36 page PDF guide is available here.  Check it out.  Maybe you need a raise?

So, what do you think?  Do the numbers surprise you?  Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscovery Daily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Daily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

Five is Alive! eDiscovery Daily is Five Years Old!

Believe it or not, it has been five years ago yesterday since we launched the eDiscovery Daily blog!

When we launched five years ago on September 20, 2010, we told you to not get “wild” with wildcards and we published our first case law post about a case where the spoliator of data was actually threatened with jail time.  Since then, we’ve published over 418 additional posts about case law, involving more than 275 distinct cases!

Back then, our goal was to be a daily resource for eDiscovery news and analysis and we’ve continued to do so for five years.  If we were a child, we would be ready for kindergarten; if we were a dog, we would be 35 (in dog years).  We’ve had nearly 450,000 visits to the site and have published over 1,250 lifetime posts!  And, every post we have published is still available on the site for your reference, which has made eDiscovery Daily into quite a knowledgebase!  We’re quite proud of that.

Comparing our first three months of existence to now, we have seen traffic on our site grow an amazing 866%!  And now, we’re the only publication that is an EDRM Education partner.  As always, we have you to thank for all of that success!  Thanks for making the eDiscovery Daily blog a regular resource for your eDiscovery news and analysis!  We really appreciate the support!

As many of you know by now, we like to take a look back every six months at some of the important stories and topics during that time.  So, here are some posts over the last six months you may have missed.  Enjoy!

Who is investing in eDiscovery Companies?  Here’s who – thanks to Rob Robinson.

Did you know that stolen health records can go for $10 each on the black market?

“Fuzzy” searching can help you find matches you might otherwise miss, but too much “fuzzy” can be a bad thing.

Signature logos can add a lot of overhead to the review process and can comprise 30% or more of an email collection.  Fortunately, there are options to address the issue.

The law firm holding your data may have suffered a breach at some point, but you may not know about it.

Earlier this year, an Arkansas lawyer claimed that he received “Trojans” with his document production from the Fort Smith police department.  And, by “Trojans”, I mean the malware kind, not the other kind.

By the way, unless Congress intervenes, new Federal Rules changes are going into effect this December.

And, if you use CCleaner (aka “Crap” Cleaner) to wipe responsive data off your drive, expect to be sanctioned for it.

This firm marked up reviewer billings over 500% (and that’s not the worst part).

If you need proof that technology assisted review can save money, perhaps this study can help.

Here are two cases on spoliation with the same spoliation claims (and even the same plaintiff), but with different outcomes.  Hmmm.

If you’re going to allow custodians to self-collect documents, you should be prepared to explain the process associated with that self-collection.

Should contract review attorneys receive overtime pay?  Are they actually performing legal work?  This case may set a precedent in that regard.

If you’re going to submit a 2,941 page privilege log, you’d better be able to demonstrate privilege.

Man’s best friend is starting to be used to assist with forensic data collections.

And, I haven’t even mentioned the Houston Astros and Ashley Madison data hacks.  Now I have.

This is just a sampling of topics that we’ve covered.  Hope you enjoyed them!

Thanks for the interest you’ve shown in the topics!  We will do our best to continue to provide interesting and useful eDiscovery news and analysis.  And, as always, please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic!  On to the next five years!

Image courtesy of TriStar pictures (Short Circuit, 1986, slightly before this blog was first published)… :o)

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscovery Daily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Daily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

Get Ready for “E-Discovery Day” and a Milestone for LitSupport Guru: eDiscovery Trends

This is sort of a “two birds with one stone” post…

We have days to celebrate all sorts of things.  According to the website Days of the Year, yesterday was “Apple Dumpling Day” and today is “Respect Day”.  Now, eDiscovery enthusiasts have an event to look forward to – “E-Discovery Day”, on December 1st of this year.  Mark your calendars.

Brought to you by EDRM, Exterro, Actiance and Today’s General Counsel, E-Discovery Day (as stated in their website) is “an industry wide initiative aimed at promoting e-discovery awareness and education. E-Discovery Day will bring together a diverse set of professionals to share experiences, discuss key trends and offer best practices over a variety of mediums with the goal of facilitating and promoting e-discovery education to the entire legal and business community.”

George Socha, founder of EDRM, states that “E-discovery is going to be with us for the long haul, which means that all of us working to resolve disputes need to improve our e-discovery IQ. With its webinars, content and other events, E-Discovery Day offers each of us a great opportunity to do just that.”

Featured speakers include Socha, David Yerich, Director of eDiscovery for UnitedHealth Group and Bob Rohlf  Counsel at Exterro.  The site currently lists four webinar events, including:

  • 2015 E-Discovery Case Law: Sanction Cases You Need to Know
  • Taking Advantage of the New FRCP E-Discovery Amendments
  • Make Your Job Easier with E-Discovery Technology
  • 3 E-Discovery Trends You Need to Prepare for in 2016

The sessions are presented by Exterro and you can register for them on the site.  You can also submit an event for inclusion on the site as well, so it sounds as though additional events will be added.  You can sign up for the E-Discovery Day newsletter to receive updates, so if you do, you’ll presumably know about additional events as they add them.

For more information or to register for the newsletter or one (or more) of the events, click here.

BTW, it’s a good thing the event wasn’t scheduled for tomorrow – that’s one of my favorite days – “Talk Like a Pirate Day”.  That could have been awkward.

Also, a congrats to Amy Bowser-Rollins and her excellent blog, Litigation Support Guru, on celebrating their four year anniversary!  Amy’s blog is one of my favorites for litigation support best practices, several of which I’ve shared on this blog.  I also finally had the pleasure of meeting Amy at ILTA a few weeks ago, after having corresponded with her on several occasions.  Earlier this year, Amy had the guts to “quit her day job” and focus on litigation support education, which is great for our industry.  Keep up the great work, Amy!

Speaking of anniversaries, we have our own coming up over the weekend.  Stay tuned for our post on Monday!

So, what do you think?  Will “E-Discovery Day” catch on?  Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscovery Daily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Daily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

Our Nation’s Largest City Now Has a Dedicated eDiscovery Group in its Law Department: eDiscovery Trends

If you can make it here, you can make it anywhere.

The New York City Law Department has created an electronic discovery group that will be dedicated to assisting the agency’s litigators with preserving and producing electronic evidence.

As reported in the New York Law Journal (NYC Law Department Creates E-Discovery Unit, by Andrew Keshner), Corporation Counsel Zachary Carter said in an internal announcement that the department had moved eDiscovery duties from the department’s Litigation Support Division into a new, separate unit “to meet the increasing demands of e-discovery”.

According to the article, Kenneth A. Becker, co-chair of the department’s Electronic Evidence Committee since 2004, will head the group and Daniel Lim will be deputy director.  About 7,000 cases are filed against the city each year, according to budget testimony from Carter in March – at that time, he testified that the torts division alone was defending approximately 20,000 cases.

According to the New York City Law Department Year in Review summary for 2014, the Litigation Support department helped expand electronic discovery in almost every litigating division, including large public policy and commercial cases with millions of documents as well as counseling client agencies on electronic record retention policies and litigation readiness strategies.  The department also supervised and managed completion of 600-plus agency affidavits in support of motions for summary judgment, as well as supervising and managing production of discovery responses in 2,700-plus matters.  So, they are certainly a busy group!  Now, a new dedicated group within the NYC Law Department will manage its eDiscovery.

So, what do you think?  Will other large cities follow suit, if they haven’t already?  Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscovery Daily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Daily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

Information Governance Now Has its Own Conference: eDiscovery Trends

If you’re not “conferenced-out” by last week’s ILTACON (which we covered before, during and after the show), here is a brand new conference dedicated to Information Governance for you to check out.

InfoGovCon (going by the hashtag #InfoGovCon2015) is being hosted by the Information Governance Initiative (IGI) from September 29 to October 1 in Hartford, CT.  That’s less than three weeks away!

The sessions begin at 1:00pm on Tuesday, September 29 and continue through Thursday, October 1 at 12:30pm.  Most of the sessions are single track presentations and panels, with a handful of breakout sessions where there are two to four sessions to choose from during those times.  They have assembled an impressive list of speakers, including:

  • Aaron Crews, Senior Associate General Counsel & Global Head of eDiscovery at Walmart
  • Richard P. Kessler, Executive Director and Head of Group Information Governance, IT Contracting and Shared Services Legal at UBS
  • Jeffrey D. Bridges, Director of Information Governance at Boehringer Ingelheim USA
  • Jessica Harman, Records & Information Management Supervisor at Phillips 66
  • Jeff Kosseff, Assistant Professor of Cybersecurity Law at the United States Naval Academy
  • Russel M. Walters, Ph.D., Research Associate Director and a fellow at Johnson & Johnson

The sessions are also relatively short, with most sessions either 30 or 45 minutes max.  So, they will be covering a lot!  Here is a link to the agenda for the conference.  There’s also an exhibition area and “data art gallery”.  Interesting!

There will also be a reception and award ceremony the first evening and a breakfast and lunch the second day to socialize with your fellow IG junkies.  You can still nominate and vote for IG award winners here for IG Professional of the year, IG Evangelist of the year and other awards.  Voting will end on September 18.

The conference will be held at the Connecticut Convention Center.  Tickets for the entire conference are $399 per person, with group rates available for three or more attendees.  And, if you use the promo code IGI15 when registering, you can save $50!

It’s your chance to get in on the ground floor and say you were there at the beginning.  And, if you need any other reasons to attend (or convince your boss that you should attend), here are seven other reasons.

So, what do you think?  Are you a big proponent of Information Governance?  If so, are you attending #InfoGovCon2015?  Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscovery Daily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Daily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

The Four V’s of Big Data: eDiscovery Trends

I love infographics!  A picture is truly worth a thousand words.  So, when I saw this infographic about big data, I felt I needed to share it.

Courtesy of IBM (which I found via the blog Stephen’s Lighthouse), The Four V’s of Big Data shows the Volume, Variety, Velocity and Veracity of big data and provides interesting tidbits, such as:

  • 40 zettabytes (43 trillion gigabytes) of data will be created by 2020, which is 300 times the data volume of 2005;
  • 6 billion people have cell phones (out of 7 billion people in the world);
  • By 2016, it is projected that there will be 18.9 billion network connections (almost 2.5 connections per person on earth);
  • 4 billion hours of video are watched on YouTube each month, 400 million tweets are sent per day and 30 billion pieces of content are shared on Facebook each month;
  • Yet, 1 in 3 business leaders don’t trust the information they use to make decisions and poor data quality costs the US economy around $3.1 trillion per year.

As always, the volume and quality of data affects organizations from both an information governance and eDiscovery standpoint, so these fun facts can be useful in conveying the challenges those organizations face today in trying to manage it all and meet their obligations.  Did you like those fun facts?  Here are some more.

So, what do you think?  How is your organization coping with big data?  Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscovery Daily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Daily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

Observations from ILTACON: eDiscovery Trends

Just flew back from ILTACON 2015 (and, boy are my arms tired!).  Even though Caesars Palace is not pager friendly, it was a terrific venue for the show again (after having been held there two years ago).  Between various meetings to pay the bills (we all have to), I found time to attend a few sessions.  Here are a few brief observations from the show and sessions.

Innovations

Catch Box: One of the unique innovations for encouraging and managing audience participation was the “catch box” (pictured above), which was a soft box containing a microphone.  You could actually throw it to the next person with a comment and it was soft, yet durable (at least in the sessions that I attended).  I used it myself when presenting at the 20 E-Discovery Warnings session that is described below.  Maybe it will “catch” on for future shows!

ILTACon App: Once again this year, ILTA provided an app that you could download to your iPhone or Android that provided all sorts of information, including maps of the exhibit hall and conference center, an activity feed, agenda for each day with details about the event (including date and time, location, speakers, etc.), details about the speakers and exhibitors, even the ability to look up attendees to see if your colleagues from past shows would be there!  Spiffy!  You could also add agenda items to your own personal agenda so that you would be reminded when those events were coming up.  Two suggestions for improvement: 1) Add the ability to add the agenda item to your Outlook calendar so that you can avoid booking meetings during the sessions that you want to attend and 2) Add a GPS feature to the Maps section so that you can see where you are in relation to where you need to go (I know that’s asking a lot, but it would be really cool.

Kendeo: Outside of the exhibit hall, there was a big board with instructions to read from several thought provoking questions, put your answer on a post-it note and post it on the board.  The artists from Kendeo, a team of talented training consultants, then represented those answers in cartoon form.  Here’s an example below – the cartoons and renderings made for a unique form of interaction!

Sessions

There were several good sessions at this year’s show.  Three sessions that I particularly enjoyed:

Litigation Support Roundtable: Moderated by Joanne Lane of Merck and Stephen Dooley of Sullivan & Cromwell, the session started off with a question asked of attendees (via provided iPads) as to the hot topics in litigation support today.  A majority of the discussion focused around technology and numerous attendees (via the “catch box”) discussed applications that they find useful to perform various litigation support functions – several of which were new to me.  I plan to find out about them and possibly cover several of them here on this blog.  Stay tuned.

To Share Or Not To Share: The Debate Over Disclosure of E-Discovery Protocols: In this session, the panelists (Patrick Oot of Shook, Hardy & Bacon, Julie Richer of American Electric Power, Philip Favro of Recommind and Alex Ponce de Leon of Google) argued mock cases in front of Judge Andrew Peck regarding the requirements for producing parties to share eDiscovery work product.  The cases included fictional names like Griswold LLC and a product liability claim by Coyote against Acme, Inc. (Oot, representing Acme, stated that Coyote was an “idiot” for never using their products right).  The debate and the rulings by Judge Peck were interesting and enlightening to see the factors considered in cases like these.

20 E-Discovery Warnings in 60 Minutes: This was the session in which I, along with nine of my colleagues, presented.  Each of us had two topics and six minutes (three minutes per topic) to cover them.  An excellent idea for covering a lot of best practices quickly (as I understand it, credit Julie Brown from Vorys for the idea).  Moderated by George Socha of Socha Consulting and Michael Boggs of Holland & Hart, the presenters also included Tom Barce of Kroll Ontrack, Douglas Brush of Kraft & Kennedy, Rodney Holaday of Vorys, Janice Jaco of Keesal, Young & Logan, Alex Lubarsky of CPA Global, Hal Marcus of Recommind, Brandon Mount of Accusoft, Scott Zimmerman of Haynes & Boone and Josh Zybershlag of Kroll Ontrack.  Kudos to David Horrigan of kCura for live tweeting during the session – the tweets are summarized here.

So, what do you think?  Did you attend ILTACON this year?  If so, what was your favorite part?  Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscovery Daily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Daily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

Thursday’s ILTACON Sessions: eDiscovery Trends

As noted yesterday, Monday and Tuesday, the International Legal Technology Association (ILTA) annual educational conference of 2015 (now known as ILTACON) is happening this week and eDiscovery Daily will be reporting this week about the latest eDiscovery trends being discussed at the show.  This is the last day to check out the show if you’re in the Las Vegas area with a number of sessions available and over 190(!) exhibitors providing information on their products and services.

Perform a “find” on today’s ILTACON conference schedule for “discovery”, “litigation support” or “information governance” and you’ll get at least 3 sessions with hits.  So, there is plenty to talk about!  Sessions in the main conference tracks include:

11:00 AM – 12:00 PM:

Develop Talent and Prove the Value of Your Internal Litigation Support

Description: With more and more vendors touting all-inclusive services, litigation support managers and directors have to show the value their departments add to the discovery process. Come hear experts talk about their experiences developing talent and managing “up” to meet the vendor challenge.

Speakers are: Scott M. Cohen – Winston & Strawn LLP; Ross Gotler – Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP; Wale Elegbe – Sullivan & Cromwell LLP; Denise Talbert – Shook, Hardy & Bacon L.L.P.

2:30 PM – 3:15 PM:

Past Performance and Future Success: What’s Next for E-Discovery?

Description: From the days of paper review to the advent of electronic scanning and to e-discovery as we now know it today, listen as industry veterans explore the evolution of our industry and share their experiences of adjusting to the times. They will explore the role of technology, adoption and expertise of the courts and government agencies, the role of the attorney, and much more!

Speakers are: Mary Pat Poteet – Project Leadership Associates, Inc.; Scott M. Cohen – Winston & Strawn LLP; Eric Lieber – Toyota Motor Sales; Beth Patterson, CLSP – Allens.

3:30 PM – 4:30 PM:

A Conversation with Judge Peck

Description: Audience members are sure to enjoy hearing respected jurist, Judge Andrew Peck, speak about various e-discovery topics.

Speakers are: Mary Pat Poteet – Project Leadership Associates, Inc.; Honorable Andrew J Peck.

For a complete summary listing of all sessions at the conference, click here.

So, what do you think?  Did you attend ILTACON this year?  What did you think of the conference?  Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscovery Daily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Daily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

Wednesday’s ILTACON Sessions: eDiscovery Trends

As noted yesterday and Monday, the International Legal Technology Association (ILTA) annual educational conference of 2015 (now known as ILTACON) is happening this week and eDiscovery Daily will be reporting this week about the latest eDiscovery trends being discussed at the show.  There’s still time to check out the show if you’re in the Las Vegas area with a number of sessions available and over 190(!) exhibitors providing information on their products and services.

Perform a “find” on today’s ILTACON conference schedule for “discovery”, “litigation support” or “information governance” and you’ll get at least 4 sessions with hits.  So, there is plenty to talk about!  Sessions in the main conference tracks include:

11:00 AM – 12:00 PM:

Building a Process Map for Culling Discovery Data

Description: The most costly stage of the discovery process is document review. To contain costs, litigation support teams must use analytics and leverage technology to reduce the amount of data that goes into review. During this hands-on workshop, attendees will develop a process for culling data based on a specific scenario with an “as is” process map. Each table will work as a team to determine the best technology, processes and people to improve efficiency in a defensible manner. Come learn how to think through and develop a process map related to e-discovery analytics!

Speakers are: Andrew P. Medeiros – Seyfarth Shaw LLP; Geoff Wilcox – UnitedLex.

Data-Driven: Leveraging Data for More Effective Risk Management and Information Governance

Description: Organizations outside of legal handle risk management with dedicated people, formal structures and better intelligence about where to deploy resources. This is a better way to manage risk, using empirical data to perform calculated, rational assessments. But where do you start? Learn how to approach risk comprehensively and intelligently instead of reactively, and hear how law firms and legal departments can use data to reduce risk and protect the business.

Speakers are: Steven Naphy – Morgan, Lewis & Bockius, L.L.P.; Bill Hardin – Navigant; Brad Waldron – Caesars Entertainment Legal Department; Christopher Calnon – ACE Group.

1:30 PM – 2:30 PM:

Aligning Information Security, Litigation Support and E-Discovery

Description: A panel of litigation support, information security and corporate legal department representatives will tackle the challenges of remaining responsive to the sea of incoming litigation support/e-discovery requests while staying in compliance with internal and external information security requirements. We will help litigation support and information security professionals understand the pressures each is under, create a shared vision of success and build the relationships necessary to drive value for clients while effectively managing risk.

Speakers are: Mr John L. Kapp – Shearman & Sterling, LLP; Dawn Radcliffe – TransCanada Pipelines; Hal Marcus – Recommind, Inc.; Lisa Markey – Shearman & Sterling, LLP.

3:30 PM – 4:30 PM:

Oracle Predictive Coding Study: Phase II Results

Description: Last year’s wildly successful session based on the results of the Electronic Discovery Institute’s predictive coding study is back for more! In this year’s follow up, we will present the next phase of results. Come get an unbiased, scientific view into the world of predictive coding.

Speakers are: Patrick L. Oot – Shook, Hardy & Bacon L.L.P.; Beth Patterson, CLSP – Allens.

For a complete summary listing of all sessions at the conference, click here.

So, what do you think?  Are you planning to attend ILTACON this year?  Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscovery Daily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Daily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.