A LAWYER’S GUIDE TO

Taking your Records Management Strategy

into the Cloud

A Lawyer’s Guide to Taking your Records Management Strategy into the Cloud

Including the cloud in a records management strategy is a smart decision for any business. Digital storage solutions are quickly becoming the preferred method of business records storage and management, and it’s easy to see why.

Whereas once many businesses and legal practices kept stores of physical records, many are now opting for more compact, more affordable digital storage solutions. But with the shift from hard-copy to digitized storage, questions regarding how to make the transition to securely, and how to approach digital business records management arise. Advancements in technology have made scalability, redundancy and security easier to access and easier to afford; and as a result, digital storage options have become a reality of doing business today.

When making a smooth and secure transition into to digital storage and records management, more and more businesses are opting for cloud based solutions for support to keep their records intact. The benefits of cloud storage are undeniable,

adding simplicity, security and reliability to any records management strategy. In addition, the cloud’s ability to safely store highly sensitive data makes it a winning choice for many law firms, who have a responsibility to protect their clients’ case files and personal data.

Any law firm can take advantage of the benefits the cloud has to offer while keeping their client records intact. Follow these business records management best practices to take your records management strategy into the cloud, keeping your records and client case files safe and stored in-line with state regulations.

Making a Clean Break from Traditional Records ManagementBefore your law firm will be ready to move its data into the cloud completely, you’ll need to make a few preparations. Breaking away from hard-copy storage will take time and will be a transition for your staff as they get used to new storage policies and procedures. Taking the time to properly prepare for the shift will help your cloud based records management strategy stick. Here are a few preparations you should consider before making the leap to cloud based records storage and management.

Keep your staff in the loop

Change isn’t always welcome and you may encounter some resistance when you inform your firm of the switch to cloud based records management. Their frustrations can be easy to brush off, but without the support of your staff your transition and move into the cloud will be challenging. Take the time to get everyone on board, making sure to explain the time-saving benefits of going digital. Many firms waste time searching for documents and files related to a case, even when a document organization and filing system is in place. Papers have a way of being misplaced, and more time gets wasted the longer they remain the way. In a paperless system, your staff will be able to simply and efficiently search to find exactly what they need in seconds. The transition may be difficult at first, but once a practice-wide implementation is made, the benefits will become apparent.

It may help to introduce your staff to the benefits of using the cloud to store data. Electronic documents are the only way to properly search for specific words or sections

without a legion of assistants to pour over pages. Add to that the financial and space saving benefits of digital storage and it’s easy to see why more lawyers are welcoming digital solutions.

Start with the proper tools

In order to prepare your documents for cloud based storage, you will need to convert them from hard copies to digital documents. If your office doesn’t already have a scanner, it will need one. Multi-function scanners are built for large scanning jobs (50 pages and up), making them the perfect solution for creating digital copies of your records quickly and more convenient. To uphold the integrity of your digital records management strategy after the shift has gone into effect, your staff may also need a scanning solution for paper records they receive moving forward. Investing in desktop scanners for all professional personnel will allow them to quickly and easily upload new documents into your cloud storage system.

As you move away from filing cabinets and into technology solutions for storage, you’ may also find that you need a tool that will help you manage, search through, and sign documents. Adobe offers powerful business products that allow you to send documents for signature, track responses, turn all PDFs into searchable documents and more. These solutions answer many of the challenges businesses are confronted with when moving away from paper documents.

Also keep in mind where you’ll store your data once it’s in digital format. Not all digital document retention solutions are created equally. Law firms shouldn’t make the mistake of storing the information they need to retain in local devices and computers alone. This poses the risk of data loss due to employee error, device damage, natural disaster, data breach, viruses and more. Keeping all of your data in one singular location is never a good idea and physical devices can’t be fully depended upon.

However, adding cloud backup into your records management strategy is just the safety net your law firm needs to keep your client records safely stored and retrievable at all times.

Be consistent

Everyone on your staff should know how to name documents so that they can be easily traced by anyone in your practice. To do this, you’ll want to establish a specific and easy to remember formula for naming documents. It may be easiest for you to first train some of the younger members of your practice as they’ll be able to adopt the changes more quickly and can help you in training the rest of your staff. By making education a focal point of your cloud based records management strategy, recovering documents from the cloud when you need them will be easy for everyone involved.

Transition slowly

Make the transition easier on yourself and your staff by not biting off more than you can chew. Begin your transition to the cloud by scanning your newest cases, open cases, and finally any cases you wish to archive. You can scan inactive cases into your system over time.

Get Smart About Cloud Based Records ManagementMany lawyers are looking to the cloud for secure digital record retention and management solutions, but how you use it matters too. When push comes to shove, online backup is the only foolproof way to make sure client documents and information remains safe and secure, but you’ll need the proper backup solution and the proper internal procedures to make your cloud based records management system work efficiently.

Cloud storage isn’t just about security and dependability, it’s also about control — being able to manage your data and access it when you need it. Therefore, you’ll want to consider the performance and security advantages of both public or private cloud storage before you decide which cloud solution is the right one to add to your records management strategy.

Public cloud storage versus private cloud storage

The most distinguished factor of public cloud storage is the sharing of computing resources among a network of users, allowing for greater flexibility and cost savings for you. This storage platform is hosted by a third-party provider to be delivered and used over the Internet, cutting capital expenses completely and only requiring manageable monthly fees. It also uses storage capacity and processor power that is not owned by the business itself, and the management responsibility is held by the vendor -- who specializes in providing this service.

Private cloud storage is similar to a public cloud storage, but critical information is stored within a system of privately dedicated resources. Calling this cloud storage private doesn’t refer to any heightened security advantage, but just that it’s comprised of non-shared resources. It’s essentially an extension of a pre-existing traditional data center, optimized to provide the storage capacity and processing power needed for a business’s functions. This demands more on the business’s resources to specify, purchase, house, update, maintain, and safeguard the physical infrastructure, along with its primary functions.

Furthermore, private cloud storage can be more costly — it’s a large initial expense, on

top of the added investment required as capacity needs grow and new equipment is added.

On the other hand, because maintaining and securing the infrastructure of a public cloud storage solution is the responsibility of the vendor, law firms can streamline and minimize the time and money spent on IT operations and system upkeep. This makes the public cloud the preferred cloud backup solution for law firms.

Selecting your cloud backup solution

The cloud solution you choose to backup your firm’s records should be comprehensive in terms of security, storage, and recoverability. Security breaches, viruses and unauthorized access are a harsh reality of doing business in today’s digital environment, but with the right cloud solution, your law firm can rely on it to keep firm data protected in line with the strictest of digital security standards. To achieve this, you’ll want to choose a public cloud backup solution -- this type of solution includes public cloud storage built in, along with an array of other security and recoverability features that cloud storage-only solutions do not provide.

Cloud backup is a more extensive and comprehensive approach to cloud storage. The main function of cloud backup is to provide blanket coverage and protection against data loss from your computer and any computers you include in your network.

Your cloud backup solution should provide end-to-end encryption so that your files remain unreadable to unauthorized users, even during transit to the cloud. Make sure the encryption feature also meets strict security standards -- either minimum 256-bit encryption, Twofish or Triple DES encryption.

In addition to encrypting your data for complete security, your cloud provider should also store

your firm’s data in redundant servers housed within secure data centers. Check that these data centers pass an annual SSAE 16 Type 2 audit to verify their procedures and facilities are up to industry standards.

Your cloud backup plan should also include a range of digital and physical safeguards. For instance, business cloud backup solution provider Nordic Backup equips its data with multiple levels of access control, from armed guards to biometric fingerprint scanners and uninterruptable power supplies to ensure client data is always protected and retrievable at all times. Some other features you should look for to keep your data safe and readily available include:

• Unlimited version histories -- so you can revert to a previous file version if needed

• The ability to backup an unlimited number of computers -- so all necessary data in your system is backed up

• Continuously synced backup -- so the latest version of your documents is always available, along with every document change you or your staff make

• Unlimited local and external hard drive backup -- so you can backup all necessary end points

Once the cloud backup portion of your records management strategy is in place, you can trust that if any of your digital data is ever corrupted, lost or irreversibly changed in one file, there will always be a secondary, intact copy ready to take its place and keep the chain of documentation intact.

Records Retention Best Practices for Law Firms

After you’ve selected a cloud backup solution to hold your data, it’s important to consider your digital records retention strategy as another puzzle piece in your overall records management strategy.

There may come a point in time when you want to remove some data from your backup to make room for new client data. As clients come and go, cleaning out case files you no longer need will free up room in your cloud backup, which can keep you from having to scale up to a larger storage capacity. However, it’s important to know how long you should retain client data so that you don’t run into problems down the road.

Setting record retention lengths for cloud data

According to the American Bar Association, just because you no longer represent a client does not mean you’re free to delete their data. Every state establishes its own record retention lengths for client records, account funds and property. Although there is some variation, the best rule of thumb is to keep client data stored for a minimum of 7 years after your representation with them has concluded. You can verify your state’s retention lengths here.

Some exceptions to these retention lengths do apply depending on the nature of the case. For instance files involved in criminal cases should be retained for the client’s lifetime, or until their consent is given. Other documents, like tax files, should also be kept longer if the client is still exposed to some related liability.

When to keep paper records

While it’s convenient to move every file into cloud storage for safekeeping, there are certain times when physical documents should be retained. In most cases, client records may be stored completely electronically; however, before you dispose of hard copies you should notify your client and also sort through their case file for any documents that have independent legal significance, such as testamentary documents, birth certificate or marriage certificates. As a rule of thumb, irreplaceable documents retain their hard copy status.

If there is any question as to whether you need to keep or are free to discard a document, check with your malpractice carrier.

Include your retention policy in your representation agreement

Your firm is not responsible for holding onto client records forever, and once your statutory minimums and due diligence are met, you should be free to properly dispose

of these client records as you see fit. To protect yourself, clearly state your records retention policy in each of your client representation agreements so that you have a trail of proof that your clients have been made aware of your policies.

In SummaryYour digital business records management strategy for the cloud should keep 4 things in mind: privacy, redundancy, statutory requirements, and client communication.

Peace-of-mind over data retention today is both more complex, yet paradoxically easier than it’s ever been when using the right cloud backup service. Cloud backup is an excellent solution for retaining your records with undeniable privacy and redundancy. For a complete cloud backup solution for businesses with all of the bells and whistles your firm needs to uphold a bulletproof cloud based records management strategy, turn to Nordic Backup. Nordic Backup encrypts all backup data with high-level 256-bit AES encryption using a private password only you know and safely stores data across redundant servers so your data is always ready to be retrieved remotely, whenever you need it.

888-668-0447 • support@nordic-backup.us

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About Nordic BackupAffordable plans, rapid data disaster recovery and secure online backup you can rely on — that’s the Nordic Backup promise.

Many years ago, long before people started calling it “the cloud,” we had a passion for secure online storage and making our backup solutions affordable and available around the world.

For more than a decade, our passion for innovation has driven us to create software solutions that not only keep pace with the changing digital space, but also do so affordably and comprehensively. As a result, we’ve created a robust line of consumer and enterprise online backup solutions, built to backup any kind of data anywhere in the world.

We know that your data is critical to you. With Nordic Backup, you’ll never be without it.

Visit www.nordic-backup.com to learn more.