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FindLaw columnist Eric Sinrod writes regularly in this section on legal developments surrounding technology and the internet. It’s obviously important for law enforcement officials to do their best to combat Cyber criminals. But is it possible that their efforts actually can cause harm by bringing down innocent Web sites in certain instances? Perhaps. The FBI seized certain web servers as part of a raid, which caused several websites to go offline, including the sites of publisher Curbed Network, according to The New York Times....

As many attorneys are aware, a suit over the enforcement of the FTC’s “red flags” rule is still making its way through the courts. This final decision on whether or not to include lawyers in the list of those who must develop programs to help identify the warning signs (the “red flags”) of identity theft has not yet been made. According to the ABA Governmental Affairs Office, the FTC first developed the red flags rule to be included in the Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act of 2003....

Are you thinking that your current career as an attorney is for the birds? If you wish you were doing something else, you’re probably facing a dilemma due to the economy. FindLaw contributor Clifford R. Ennico wrote a piece on changing legal careers, including five ways to change legal careers. The strategies are worth revisiting: Strategy No. 1: Work for Free This is a good way to get your foot in the door....

If you’re a woman, you’ve probably experienced some form of street sexual harassment. Catcalls, obscene comments, or even an inappropriate compliment can all make a person’s day uncomfortable. Now some women have decided to stop taking these comments lying down. Simply install the Hollaback application on your smartphone, and you have what Good Technology calls an equivalent to a digital “rape whistle.” Users can report harassment incidents in real time, and can use a map function to display where the incident occurred....

For most lawyers, Thanksgiving is the beginning of the end … of the year, that is. And even for those lawyers that have to meet a billable hour requirement, like every other person employed in a non-retail job, once that first Thanksgiving break hits, the natural tendency is to hit the coast button. However, nothing brings that holiday coasting to a screeching halt like an unwanted call from an opposing counsel or client with some unforeseen task or dispute....

Leaving your law firm amicably is sort of like an amicable divorce. Sure, it happens. Not always, but sometimes. The key to a good split is having the same goals – to avoid unpleasantness and maintain profitability. Here are some tips on how to part ways without rancor. Timing Is Everything People tend to know when it is time to part company. It’s like that internal clock that tells us to wake up in the morning, or maybe it’s just the sun shining in our eyes....

“He who steals my purse, steals trash,” William Shakespeare wrote, explaining that money doesn’t last. “But he who filches my good name robs me of that which not enriches him and makes me poor indeed.” The great writer bled wisdom on the pages of literary history, leaving such truisms that adorn centuries of libraries and the freshest web pages today. Of course, he also wrote that the first thing to do in a new order is to kill all the lawyers, so whatever....

FindLaw columnist Eric Sinrod writes regularly in this section on legal developments surrounding technology and the Internet. Most of us have heard about sexting – the practice of people sharing naked pictures of themselves online. Indeed, there have been press reports that suggest texting has become the latest teenage craze. Fact or fiction? Perhaps a bit of both. Recent studies by the journal Pediatrics show that 1% of children between the ages of 10 to 17 have engaged in sexting....

Cross-examination is fun. You ask a series of rapid-fire questions, ones that you hopefully know the answers to (surprises are rarely a good thing), and attempt to undermine the witness’s testimony, either by catching him in an outright lie, or by exposing weaknesses in his story. Your quest to make the witness look like a jackass in front of the jury is guaranteed by the Confrontation Clause of Sixth Amendment to the U....

A probate court in Ohio addressed a novel issue of law earlier this week when it had to decide whether a will, drafted on a tablet, (no, not that kind of tablet, this kind) was valid under Ohio state law. Javier Castro was told by doctors at the Mercy Regional Medical Center that he needed a blood transfusion to survive. As a Jehovah’s Witness, he declined treatment. Before his death, however, he told two of his brothers that he wished to draft a will....

Even in Web 2.0 world, the telephone – and its constant companion, voice mail – are still with us. There are actually a lot of people out there who prefer the scintilla of human interaction the phone provides over the cold, lifeless specter of email. (Or the tantalizing fun of Snapchat.) As with every office practice, voice mail has its own etiquette and best practices guide. Here some of the rules you should keep in mind for professional and efficient voice mail communications:...

As someone who “grew up geek,” I always had the desire to try Linux. Unfortunately, the last time I had spare time was in high school, and Red Hat Linux wasn’t compatible with my six-year-old desktop computer. After a few frustrating hours, I gave up, reinstalled Windows 2000, and then spent the next few years in blissful ignorance of the Linux landscape, as Windows XP and 7 were both masterpieces....

Some in-house attorneys lament a life devoid of excitement and limelight. But considering the plight of the in-house team at Michigan State University right now, those bored by their in-house drudgery should probably change those lamentations to celebrations. In a recent post on Above the Law, whose editorial coverage and reader comments are second to none when it comes to legal snark, the university’s in-house job was described as “The Absolute Worst In-House Job Right Now....

An Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals panel ruled this week that banana peels on an employee’s truck can form the basis of an employment discrimination lawsuit. Cue Gwen Stefani’s “Hollaback Girl,” because this case is about to get bananas. (B-A-N-A-N-A-S.) At some point after Jones’ driver training period ended, he began to find remnants of bananas, such as banana peels and bananas that had been broken in half, on his delivery truck at the UPSF Trussville terminal where he occasionally parked his delivery truck....

When Congress enacted the America Invents Act in 2011, the USPTO was charged with designating four satellite office locations, and they chose: Detroit, Denver, Silicon Valley and Dallas. The Detroit office was successfully opened in July 2012, the Denver office is hiring, and the Dallas office has been operating out of a temporary space since 2013. What’s going on with the Silicon Valley office? The USPTO’s Silicon Valley satellite office is operating out of a less central temporary office, and is only staffed with a few Patent Trial and Appeal Board judges, according to Corporate Counsel....

The U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals spared Solar City an embarrassing loss, but also said it was a “mismanaged organization in need of closer financial oversight.” The decision scrolls back to the company’s initial public offering in 2012, when it raised more than $92 million. It put the company up in a big way, later leading Tesla to buy it for $2.6 billion in 2016. But there were those investors who lost money....

The phrase “attorneys read a lot” is something of an understatement. It’s a Sisyphean task to keep up with both case information and the myriad of articles and web publications that cover different aspects of law. SpokenLayer’s goal is make a significant portion of the web audio friendly and make those audio files available to web users. App owners can then listen to relevant articles and publications while doing other things like exercising or running errands....

FindLaw columnist Eric Sinrod writes regularly in this section on legal developments surrounding technology and the Internet. Cyber crime is not new. And despite grappling with it now for years, the cost of cyber crime continues to increase. This has been made plain by the 2013 Cost of Cyber Crime Study by the Ponemon Institute that was sponsored by Hewlett-Packard. What do we learn from this study? Well, for starters, the annual cost of cyber crime is a staggering $11....

The 10 most popular posts of 2014 on FindLaw’s Strategist blog ran the gamut – from things you could learn from Frank Underwood to a judge beating a public defender (not in a battle of wits; like, with his fists). Did your favorite post make the cut? Read on to find out. (Note: My favorite post – about lawyer typography – came in at No. 12. But I got it in here anyway!...

The unfinished business doctrine: it can happen to you. And it’s happening to the now-defunct Heller Ehrman. When the firm disbanded and filed for bankruptcy three years ago, partners took their business and fled to new firms. But now the bankruptcy trustee is going after those partners and their firms, seeking payment for Heller’s debt. Turns out that the unfinished business doctrine prevents debt from disappearing even when a law firm no longer exists....