2008 ABA Legal Technology Survey Report

The first two volumes of the 2008 ABA Legal Technology Survey Report, the new-for-2008 Baseline and Budgets (Vol. 1) and Law Office Technology (Vol. 2), are now available.  Highlights from the first two volumes include

• The 2008 survey observed a significant migration of respondents’ use of desktop computers to laptops.  Use of laptop computers jumped to 83% in the 2008 survey from 69% in the 2007 survey for solo respondents and to 73% from 59% for respondents from firms of 2 to 9 attorneys.
• The availability of Smartphones/BlackBerrys has increased considerably. In 2008 76% of respondents reported the availability of smartphones or BlackBerries at their firms, up from 55% in the 2007 survey and 49% in the 2006 survey.
• File Server availability has increased in this year’s survey to 85% from 73% in 2007.  This figure was nearly doubled for solo respondents, to 51% from 28%. Dell (59%) and HP/Compaq (17%) were the most-named brands, with 19% using custom servers.
• Proceed with caution!  While only eight percent of respondents report that their firms have experienced a security breach, 47% report that their law firm technology has been infected with a virus, spyware or malware.  However, no significant business disruption or loss resulted from the infection for 53% perhaps due to diligent backup practices; more than four-fifths (82%) of respondents report that their firm has a backup strategy.

The schedule for remaining volumes will be Litigation and Courtroom Technology (June), Web and Communication Technology (June), Online Research (July) and Mobile Lawyers (July). Details on the ABA site. [JH]