Firms are under the pressure from cybersecurity risk, regulators, and client demands to secure non-public data and limit access to those who need to know. Unlike ethical walls and information barriers which are dictated by the conflicts or risk process of new matter intake, access levels such as need-to-know are typically determined by the lawyer who ‘owns’ or is responsible for a matter. For inclusionary walls, the conflicts team determines who can have access, whereas in need-to-know security, the partner, or delegate can make that decision. As matter content is stored across multiple systems, managing access becomes more complex; best practice dictates that end users have the ability to request and grant access to matters or individual documents as appropriate. Service desks should be able to support the process.

Improved data security assessment while adhering to the industry-set standard for data compliance