Futurelawyer

#WhyIAmASolo. Lawyer...Represent Thyself.

Ransomware-how-clicking-on-one-phishing-email-left-a-whole-business-in-big-troubleDo you know what your BigLaw employees are doing at their desks? Do you know what emails they are opening, and what attachments they are viewing? Of course not. This is a cautionary tale about one employee at one company who opened a phishing email, and almost brought down the entire company. This could happen to your law firm. This could even happen to the FutureLawyer; but, since I am the only one here, I have a pretty good idea what is being clicked. If I ever got zapped with a phishing or ransomware attack, I have no one to blame but myself.

Essential Tools For The Road Warrior.

How To Use Copy And Paste On Android. We lawyers are a verbose lot. We communicate complex topics with words, and the attempt to be precise can require a lot of words. Now that many of us are road warriors, we do a lot of our communicating on mobile devices, like smartphones and tablets. What to do? Well, an old word processing trick that many of us learned to use expertly in Word, or WordPerfect is the ticket. When using or creating a document in a Smartphone, you can long press on a block of text, and move the beginning and ending arrows wherever you want. Then, click Copy and go to the email or other document you are working on. Press and choose Paste. Presto, the block of text appears. No long finger typing session. Just verbose lawyer stuff appearing magically on the device. You're welcome.

Why Are LawBlogs Boring?

14 Ways To Get Your LawBlog More Attention. I used to write a lawblog. I don't remember exactly when it became just a blog by a lawyer; but, it was between 2005 and 2010. My initial focus was on how tech and gadgets impact the practice of law; and, in some sense, I still write about that. But, it is even more difficult, I realized, to be interesting when you are talking about arcane legal theories and cases. Law impacts all of us; but, seldom directly. And, the theory behind case law is that last thing on the mind of an individual involved in a real like factual dilemma. So, when I started writing about things that interested me, such as poetry and philosophy and humor, I enjoyed blogging much more, and it became like daily journaling. It is a way to record what I am thinking about at any moment. It is much easier to do that than to find interesting ways of blogging about a specific aspect of law. If you are still interested in law blogging, check out this article by my friend, and the dean of all law blogging, Kevin O'Keefe. He has written, and spoken, about much more; but, meeting him at a Chicago conference in 2005, and learning about blogs, changed my life. Thanks, Kevin. I owe you.

GMail Problems? Or, Is It Us?

Spam Filter Broken In GMail? Whatever happened to personal responsibility? This piece in Forbes asserts that the sky is falling because many users have been getting spam and other bad emails in their In Box. I can remember when we didn't rely on far away computer algorithms to protect us from emails that we shouldn't be opening. Spam filters are certainly convenient. They separate a lot of chaff from the wheat when I am checking email. But, they aren't perfect, and I still need to look at the spam emails to determine if they contain a false positive. In addition, every user of email, Gmail or otherwise, should look critically at emails before opening links in them. Is this the apocalypse that the Terminator movie franchise predicted? Are we becoming so reliant upon our machines that we have lost the ability to think for ourselves? Use your brain. Make judgments about your In Box without the intervention of a search engine. Jeez.

Google Knows What You Are Doing...What Are You Going To Do About It?

Google Collects A Frightening Amount Of Data About You...Delete It. I know. You don't do anything hinky online. You only search sites describing Churches and Food, and you never email sketchy people. Even so, what if I told you that Google (which I use all the time, because it performs useful services) knows your name, your face, your birthday, gender, other email addresses you use, your password and phone number? What if it determines what is public and what is not? When a new site asks you to sign up using Google (much easier than entering a lot of data) you click through the permissions without reading them, don't you? The company records every search you perform and every YouTube video you watch.  Google Maps logs everywhere you go, the route you use to get there and how long you stay -- even if you never open the app. I have always considered that this was okay (what better alibi than your computer location record?) but then I read about the guy who happened to be in the area of a crime on a regular basis, and who got arrested. So, ghost your Google masters on a regular basis. You know who is watching. Make them turn off the recorder. Do it now.

LegalFuel - Free Help For Lawyers

Legal Fuel Document Library. Many lawyers dream of opening their own law practice. Some of us have been solo or in small firms for many years. But, practicing law is tough enough without worrying about law office management. The Florida Bar provides a lot of free help to lawyers who are setting up practices. This particular site has many documents and forms to help. Everything is here, and, if you are starting a law practice, begin your journey here. The forms are generic, so you don't have to be a Florida lawyer to use them. Good luck.

If You Don't Use Multi Factor Authentication, The Bad Guys Will.

https://ridethelightning.seif-you-dont-enable-multi-factor-authentication-crooks-will-do-it-for-you. Sharon Nelson, at Senseient, is one of the best security people on the planet, and she is talking today about two factor authentication, which, as my readers know, is the first security tip I give, and give often. But, she has an interesting take on it, which I share with you. These days, much tech support is automated, and it can be a nightmare trying to get to a human being. If you aren't using two factor authentication, and a hacker takes your identity, the first thing the hacker will do is enable, guess what? Two factor authentication. At that point, until you can reach a sympathetic human being, you are SOL. So, suck it up, buttercup. On every website you can, enable two factor authentication. You will be glad you did. Thanks, Sharon.  

Windows Update Is Essential To Your Security

Windows Computers Aren't Getting Patched. The most recent Windows monthly security update patched 132 vulnerabilities. None of them had been exposed in the wild; but, if you need a reason why Microsoft OS defaults to getting the updates, and makes it difficult to turn them off, that is it. Operating systems ALWAYS have bugs in the system. With millions of lines of code, it is inevitable. I talk a lot about computer security and data security. For lawyers, it is essential, because we deal with confidential information every day. However, most of you have older computers still buzzing along that aren't being regularly updated. I talk mostly about two factor authentication, and other ways to limit risk when information is accessed or stored in the cloud; but, just keeping the computer software current is the first step. How long would your car run without regular maintenance? When that check engine light goes on, do you investigate immediately whether it is caused by something as simple as a loose gas cap? Go to Windows Update and make sure your computers, all of them, are running the latest version. Do it now. Tomorrow may be too late.

 

When Facebook Photos Become Google Photos

How To Transfer Facebook Photos To Google Photos. Do you know where your photos are? Probably scattered all over the place. If you have followed the FutureLawyer's advice, you have long since started using the best free photo aggregator and storage service out there, Google Photos. Just about every photo I have take for the last few years, and some earlier ones, are archived on Google's servers, and the service has gotten better every year. But, I also post a lot of photos to Facebook, and, while I can access them on the Facebook Photos page, they are nowhere near as accessible as in the albums and other ways I have them organized on Google Photos. So, check out this menu option the next time you are on Facebook, and preserve all that goodness in an organized fashion. You never know when you will have had enough of Facebook and social media. Backup, backup, backup.

How To Keep Your Personal And Client Data Safe And Secure On Your Android Phone

Things You Can Do To Keep Your Android Phone Safe And Secure. When I left my Smartphone in a Las Vegas restaurant a few years ago, I suddenly became a bigger fan of Smartphone security. I realized that, while I didn't store a lot of personal data on the phone itself, the phone was a window to just about every piece of personal and confidential information stored in the cloud. Possession of the phone, in the hands of the bad guys, would be very bad. When I loaded up my FindMyPhone app on the laptop I was carrying at the hotel, I was relieved to find that the phone was located at the restaurant SWMBO and I had just left. After a rather frenzied cab ride back to the restaurant, I was relieved to find that the restaurant staff had it at the front desk. We laughed about it later, and it became our Las Vegas "adventure", rushing through the streets of glitter town on an emergency search. But, these days, the problem is worse, and our phones store or have access to, more information than ever. Secure your phone. Secure your data. You never know who is watching. Use two factor authentication all the time. Use a screen lock all the time. Never download anything from a source other than the Playstore. Use a VPN. Get rid of apps you don't use. If you haven't used an app in 3 months, delete it. Buy Malwarebytes, or a similar malware scanner designed for Android. Update the phone every time a system update pops up on your phone. Most phones get these monthly these days. Be safe out there.