ANAND AND ANAND PLANS TO IMPLEMENT AND ENHANCE CAPABILITY ON SECURITY APPROACH

SUBROTO PANDA
Chief Information Officer, Information Technology Group, Anand and Anand

KEY PRIORITIES OF 2020

In our organizations, the digital workplace toolkit is broadly defined in eight categories to sustain the ways in which you communicate, collaborate, connect, and deliver day-to-day services. Too often, organizations implement these tools in silos without the benefit of a holistic digital workplace strategy.

Over the time we have developed our own capabilities for the design and deployment of future- ready IT systems that can flex as needed for innovation. Learn to use them to quickly reorient our operations while retaining the quality of user experience that our clients and members expect.

For example, our lawyers and members can reconfigure our client’s engagement systems as the market changes. Your CRM system can lead teams to think more creatively about identifying and approaching customers.

Analysis shows emerging technology poses major new security challenges. But most C-suite executives are underestimating the risk—an oversight that could have profound effects on both innovation and growth potential.

We have organized the IT operating model in this way which offers many benefits. They include enhanced business–IT alignment, the ability to deliver faster innovation and greater value, more effective investments, and a simplified vendor landscape.

We plan to implement and enhance our capability on security approach for future-ready with our detailed technology analysis on:

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE - AI presents a completely new attack surface, including expanded approaches for machine learning models.

5G - 5G features such as virtualization, hyper-accurate location tracking and increased volume and speed of the network are escalating security challenges.

QUANTUM - This new computing paradigm presents numerous threats to organizations and data. Discover ways to safeguard against novel attack vectors, secure “trans pilers” and prepare now for post-Quantum cryptography.

EXTENDED REALITY - A variety of XR modalities present related vulnerabilities, especially when XR content is transferred over the cloud and AI recognition capabilities are on the cloud-as-a-service.

COMBINING BREAKTHROUGH & FUSION APPROACH

In a world where the old maxim “one technology-one industry” no longer applies, a singular breakthrough strategy is inadequate; Legal firms/companies need to include both the breakthrough and fusion approaches in their technology strategies.

First, the market drives the R&D agenda, not the other way around. If the customer wants a cheaper, smaller, and more reliable numerical controller for a machine tool, then that is the starting point for setting up R&D projects-not what the technologist has produced in the lab. Developing such a market-driven approach begins with demand articulation.

Second, companies need intelligence-gathering capabilities to keep tabs on technology developments both inside and outside the industry. Good surveillance goes beyond formal efforts, such as monitoring patent applications around the world. All employees, from senior managers to frontline workers, should be part of the collection and dissemination process as active receivers.

Third, technology fusion grows out of long-term R&D ties with a variety of companies across many different industries. Investment in research consortia, joint ventures, and partnerships goes beyond tokenism. Even though the risk of participation in many of these R&D ventures is high, the risk of nonparticipation is often much higher. Therefore, management must accept that it cannot evaluate each research investment on a short-term financial basis.

As enterprise becomes more and more data-driven, the need for quality data for law firm becomes essential. To this end, the race is on to enrich, remediate, and deduplicate enterprise data. Existing approaches rely either on human judgments about individual data points or on hard-and-fast rules that apply to entire data sets; in developing a new Data Labeling Workbench, we look forward to create a lightweight tool to significantly enhance and accelerate these data augmentation efforts. The Labeling Workbench uses AI techniques to provide a means for human experts to convey their knowledge in an efficient way and iteratively refine the resulting augmentations.

Fusion will play an increasingly important role in product development efforts in the future as more and more companies integrate it into their overall technology strategies.

CYBER SECURITY

One of the most immediate changes caused by COVID-19 for attorneys is the unprecedented number of attorneys working remotely. Outside law firms have, almost overnight, mobilized a remote work force throughout the country (and globally as well) of attorneys and support staff. Collaboration tools, like web-based videoconferencing platforms, have become key elements of many attorneys’ work processes. The integration of these tools is unlikely to go away, even as attorneys return to the physical workspace.

Further, many courts have embraced technology in unprecedented ways. Judicial hearings via videoconference or teleconference are now commonplace, and judges are becoming increasingly comfortable with using technology to conduct court business and ensure that cases are moving forward. In the alternative dispute resolution arena, many mediators, arbitrators, and neutrals have wholeheartedly embraced technology and conducted mediations and hearings through videoconferencing tech.

Moreover, the practical effect of the economic downturn has meant that legal consumers are interested in identifying ways to lower legal cost. As a means to deliver value and drive efficiencies, lawyers and law firms should strongly consider remaining nimble and open to tools already available (and rapidly developing) that automate certain legal services, such as responding to complaints and discovery as well as automation of document review and other services traditionally performed by attorneys. When scaled, these tools can drastically reduce the cost of services provided by outside counsel and drive significant cost savings to clients.

The changes caused to the legal profession by the coronavirus pandemic are unlikely to be short term.

The sudden embrace of new technology has led to cybersecurity risks for law firms and employees working remotely. As organizations we should embrace cybersecurity and data privacy best practices to avoid data breaches and any compromise of internal or client data. For example, law firms must ensure that data is encrypted and that access to encrypted data is tightly controlled. Contracts with tech vendors should be closely reviewed to confirm that they contain terms with sufficient data protection protocols. With respect to videoconferencing, simple steps can minimize the risk of intrusion (or conference bombing), like separately sending conference meeting identification numbers and passwords or turning on participant identification features. Further, virtual private network (VPN) use is advisable if possible; a VPN provides a direct connection to an organization’s normal computer applications as if an employee were directly connected to the organization’s computer network. Moreover, reminders to personnel of phishing risks and firm policies regarding malware are important and should be refreshed regularly during a remote work environment.