Technology

Three leading digital pioneers yesterday told law firms to “give clients what they want” rather than what they think clients want, whether that is a daily blog or free legal documents.

National laws on protecting privileged legal communications are outdated and need to be brought into the digital age, according to the body representing Europe’s lawyers in a major new report.

Firms that are adapting to the way the legal market is changing “will have to face the hard truth that their actions today won’t be understood for years”, an investigation into the future of the law has concluded.

A legal research website which relies on crowdsourcing and ranks content according to user ratings, launched this week. My Learned Friend is backed by £60,000 of funding from a local technology investor.

The world’s largest lawyer rating website could be heading for the UK after raising £22m in new capital, Legal Futures can reveal. Avvo, a US-based company, applies its proprietorial rating to more than 97% of lawyers in America.

A website that connects the public directly with barristers is the latest legal business to seek crowdfunding after it launched a bid to raise £150,000 in expansion capital. The site, myBarrister, wants to sign up 1,000 barristers by the end of the year.

A groundbreaking online dispute resolution (ODR) service is gearing up for live trials of its expanded 2.0 version, which will initially offer an end-to-end legal support package for divorcing couples.

Solicitors have been warned to be on alert for scam e-mails that appear to come from the Law Society and have attachments that potentially contain a virus. It follows the recent phishing attack using e-mails that looked as though the SRA had sent them.

The number of reported attempts trying to defraud the public by using bogus law firms soared by 57% last year, the Solicitors Regulation Authority revealed yesterday as it brought forward publication of a cybercrime guide.

A commercial legal research website is under development that aims to harness the power of crowdsourcing to generate content and become the starting point for enquiries by law student and lawyers. It has just received £60,000 in private investment.

A long-standing seller of legal documents is set to launch a venture selling simple packages of documents aimed at website developers and people running online businesses.

A London media law firm has become what is believed to be the UK’s first legal practice to accept the virtual currency bitcoin in payment for its services.

An online legal service aimed at small businesses and “democratising the law” has almost completed its second round of ‘crowdfunding’, raising more than £100,000 in less than a month as it targets ambitious expansion.

Harnessing the communications power of the digital revolution can go a long way towards filling the access to justice gap created by cuts in legal aid, according to a major report.

LegalZoom – the online US legal services business that recently launched in the UK – has strengthened its financial position by selling a large chunk of the business to leading European private equity company Permira.