What Even You Should Know

by Tom McNichol

Ever wonder what's really going on inside your desktop computer? If you're like most attorneys, probably not.

But every lawyer should know a few basics. Because, as it turns out, a host of computer problems can easily be solved without the help of a paid technician. And understanding the peculiar logic of computers can help you avoid embarrassing errors in your law practice.

Here are three areas of competence you should develop for stress-free interaction:

1. Know How to Troubleshoot.
Before you tackle any tech quandary, remember the first rule: Do no harm. If there's anything more frustrating than a computer problem, it's making the problem worse by trying to fix it. So before you do anything else, protect what you have. If you're able to, save all of your current work, which includes any file you've opened recently. Save it online, or on a hard drive, a compact disc, or a memory stick, if you prefer.

Then pull out the oldest trick in the book: Turn your computer off, let it sit for two minutes, and turn it on again. There's a reason why this so often works. Rebooting clears the machine's memory register and resets it back to a previous, hopefully more stable condition.

If your problem persists, next try to determine whether it's a hardware or a software problem. You can check your various hardware devices by accessing your computer's Device Manager in Microsoft Windows. (On a Mac, go to the Apple icon drop-down menu and select About This Mac, then choose More Info.) The Device Manager lists all the hardware on your computer. Devices that aren't working properly or aren't being "seen" will be marked, and further dialog boxes may provide details about the problem and suggestions for how to fix it.

If your computer is running slowly, it may not have enough memory, or it may be harboring uninvited guests in the form of viruses or other malware. You can run a system check within Windows, or use software such as Norton AntiVirus to clean up your operating system.

Following these basic steps will solve a surprising number of your computer problems. And even if they don't, you'll have significantly narrowed the list of possible causes.

2. Know How to Protect Your Practice from Intruders.
One of the most common ways hackers gain access to a law firm's computer system is by duping an unsuspecting lawyer into giving away the keys to the virtual front door.

Sophisticated hackers typically engage in "phishing": They'll disguise themselves as a legitimate businesses - a bank or an online service such as PayPal or Amazon in an effort to trick users into surrendering confidential information that may help them gain access into an office computer system.

To thwart would-be phishers, never, ever open a link that appears in an email unless you are 100 percent confident of the sender. Legitimate businesses and financial institutions will never email you requesting that you click on a link to verify or update your personal information, reset your password, or log in to view your account. If you bank online, simply create a bookmark of your bank's website in your browser, and use that to connect to your bank in the event you receive an email message. The same goes for other e-commerce sites: If you get an unfamiliar request to go to a website, always access it from your browser or a search engine like Google.

In website security, the weak link is often the "secret" questions and answers that many sites ask you to verify in order to reset your password. Even if your password is hard to figure out, the secret answers may be easy to guess - such as your mother's maiden name or your place of birth. Many sites let users devise their own security questions and answers that aren't as easy to guess.

3. Redact Electronic Documents With Care.
Many word processing programs, including Microsoft Word, let users black out text by superimposing a dark box over the sensitive passages. But that only changes what's displayed on the computer screen, not necessarily the underlying text. In many cases, the superimposed box can be easily removed, exposing the sensitive material beneath.

Some lawyers have learned this lesson the hard way: In December, attorneys for the Transportation Security Administration mistakenly allowed supposedly redacted information from an internal guide to the agency's passenger screening procedures to be posted on the Internet. In the posted document sensitive information about certain exceptions to the screening process were blacked out, but the redacted sentences could be revealed with a simple cut-and-paste of the text back into a word-processing program.

Most electronic redaction blunders take place in just that way: Someone takes a Word document and superimposes a solid black bar over the text to be redacted. The Word document is then converted to PDF, and the new document appears to retain the black bar over the redacted text. But it doesn't. More sophisticated snoopers can also tap into the PDF's metadata, which reveals information about prior revisions to the document, including comments from the redacting lawyers. Yikes.

The secret here shouldn't be a secret: What you see on a computer screen is not necessarily what you get. The image of a document on a screen is only a visual approximation of the underlying electronic document. Never assume that what appears on the screen can't be read in some other way.

These days, when redaction is done sloppily, it's usually the lawyers who end up with the black mark.

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