Legal technology issues don’t stop at the water’s edge.
UK publication Infoconomy takes a welcome and practical approach to legal issues facing companies regarding technology and operations that do not fit into convenient jurisdictional boundaries.
Here’s a tech guy with a clear eye:
Too many CIOs behave as technology officers and do not take enough of a lead on legal issues, said Michael Colao, director of information management at banking group Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein.
Relying on legal departments to manage corporate exposure to risk from increasing regulation is a wildly optimistic approach, he told delegates at the Effective IT Summit: Legal departments invariably base their approach on local laws, but this is ineffective in a global economy. “My service delivery follows the sun and is not limited to any one country.”
The article further mentions a requirement for password length under Italian law that can apparently result in jail time for using passwords that are too short.
What is really going on here is a recognition that the modern corporate legal department (CLD) cannot function as a fortress. Virtually all areas of company operations face legal constraints, and the CLD can’t be everywhere, looking over everyone’s shoulder, all the time. A GC and other CLD members have to pick their focus areas carefully, spend time as needed and then move along smartly.
The days of sitting back in the corner office and waiting for people to bring you documents to stamp and initial are long gone.
