WebCredenza 2025 Shared spaces: Ethics of remote and virutal offices

Technology allows lawyers far more flexibility to practice law than ever before. Lawyers can work in shared offices, splitting expenses with other small firms or solo practitioners. They can work remotely, from home or virtually anywhere, with basic computer and networking technology. But all these innovations come with ethics traps. These include issues of communications and confidentiality, supervising outsourced work, multijurisdictional practice, and managing all the technology used to practice law from home. This program will provide you with a practical guide to ethical issues when working from home or anywhere but a traditional office.

• Disclosure to clients of the virtual nature of law offices.
• Duty of competence as a duty to understand technology.
• Electronic communications, confidentiality, and ethical risks in virtual law offices.
• How websites and a “virtual” presence implicate multijurisdictional practice issues.
• Outsourcing work to paralegal services, including fee-sharing issues.

Opinions and positions stated by presenters of MoBarCLE programs are those of the presenters and not necessarily those of The Missouri Bar. This program is intended as information for lawyers in Missouri, in conjunction with other research they deem necessary, in the exercise of their independent judgment.