Texting, Emails, and Phishing in the Law Firm: Back to Basics

Agenda / Content Covered

2:00 — 5:15, Peter Ostermiller

1. Managing Email Accounts and Storing Data (Duty of Confidentiality)
   1. Do Lawyers Have a Duty to Be Reachable by Text and Email?
   2. Cloud Storage and Data Security
   3. Best Practices in Password Creation and Storage
   4. How to Determine Which Emails to Delete - and When
   5. Metadata: What You Must Know
   6. Outsourcing and Safeguarding Confidentiality
2. Sending and Receiving Emails: Legal Essentials
   1. Inadvertently Creating an Attorney-Client Relationship Over Email
   2. Receiving Emails Intended for Someone Else: Legal Essentials
   3. Dangers Posed by Using "Reply All"
   4. Failing to Identify and Safeguard Privileged Documents: Top Risks
   5. Risks in Using the Same Email Account for Professional and Personal Purposes
   6. Guidelines for Protecting Discovery Materials
3. Maintaining Ethical Standards When Texting: Essential Guidelines
   1. How to Communicate Ethically With Clients Over Text: Legal Best Practices
   2. Failure to Preserve Texts: Potential Liability Concerns
   3. Safeguarding Confidentiality: What NOT to Send Via Text
   4. The Dos and Don'ts of Texting: With Examples
4. What You Need to Know About Messenger Apps
5. Preventing and Addressing Cybersecurity Threats
   1. Types of Attacks and Hacks
   2. Primer on Ransomware
   3. How to Detect Potential Scams
   4. Practical Guidance for Mitigating Damage
      1. Recordkeeping
      2. Best Practices for Updating Policies and Procedures
   5. Remote Work, Applicable Ethics Rules, and Cybersecurity Considerations
   6. Recent Security Compromises in Law Firms (With Examples)

Accreditation Details:

Peter L Ostermiller is a sole practitioner concentrating in legal ethics and professional responsibility matters. Mr. Ostermiller represents attorneys in disciplinary and reinstatement proceedings, judges in judicial ethics matters, and bar exam applicants. He has also represented parties in attorney’s fee dispute proceedings, attorneys in legal proceedings in which sanctions have been sought against the attorney, represented parties in attorney disqualification proceedings, and counseled lawyers and law firms in their respective rights, responsibilities and duties to other attorneys and their clients. He is a member of the Kentucky Bar Association, Louisville Bar Association and the Association of Professional Responsibility Lawyers. Mr. Ostermiller served on the Kentucky Bar Association's Ethics 2000 Committee which proposed changes to the Rules of Professional Conduct to the KBA, which resulted in the July 2009 revisions to the Ethics Rules. He graduated with his B.A. and J.D. degrees from the University of Louisville.