Peer to Peer Magazine

PEER TO PEER: THE QUARTERLY MAGA ZINE OF ILTA 56 With the number of mobile devices at 7.2 billion — surpassing the number of people in the world, according to GSMA Intelligence and the U.S. Census Bureau — mobile devices are quickly becoming the primary way people share and interact with information. WHAT TO WORRY ABOUT This trend is making mobile-enabled collaboration technology like Slack and Dropbox popular tools for many organizations looking to share information more freely with co-workers and clients. When considering adopting technology from providers like these, legal departments and firms need to work with IT to assess vendors carefully on several fronts. First are the short-term and long-term impacts such solutions will have on your data and client privacy. When it comes to sharing information with others over mobile devices, the biggest question organizations must ask is, "Where is the information going, and where has it been?" This is important for a number of reasons, such as client confidentiality. In addition, organizations must ensure employees at the company can view data while working, but won't be able to take it with them if they move to another job. If popular billion-dollar companies like Lyft and Uber are still having issues keeping documents private, taking a careful, measured approach is important for all organizations. While security is paramount, it's equally important to ensure that your collaboration vendor's offering is easy to use and intuitive. If not, employees and staff will be reluctant to use it. Then you face the security risk of employees using their own unapproved applications. One way organizations can help is by investing in proper training. Doing so spurs adoption and minimizes employees turning to other unapproved applications. QUESTIONS TO ASK MOBILE COLLABORATION PROVIDERS by Yuri Sagalov of AeroFS KNOWLEDGE IS POWER To help your IT department find the right solution for your needs, here are nine questions to ask collaboration technology vendors: How do you comply with current policies in place at my organization? What happens if information gets subpoenaed? How do you make sure that when a partner leaves they can't take a client list with them? How do you secure and scan files to audit what employees are doing? How do you know what data are going through the system? How do you ensure your mobile collaboration complies with our email retention policy? Once a file is on an employee's mobile device, how do you know what's happening with it? (if your organization has a bring your own device policy) How long does your collaboration technology take to deploy? How easy is it for employees to learn and adopt your technology? Once these questions are answered, legal IT administrators will be armed with information needed to pick the provider that's right for the organization. Then you'll be closer to giving your employees the best collaboration tools available, while meeting the privacy, security and confidentiality needs of the business and clients. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 9

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