Tech Tip
Keeping Your Identity Safe
Are you proactive or reactive in determining whether your personally identifiable information (Social Security number, date of birth, banking information, and the like) has been used after a data breach?
If you want to be proactive, consider subscribing to paid services. LifeLock, for example, provides identity theft protection that will alert you if your identity is being used to open accounts and will provide reimbursement, up to a specified sum, if funds are stolen as a result of identity theft.
Also, check into credit cardholder benefits. Discover Card, for example, provides Social Security, new account, and new credit inquiry alerts to its cardholders.
Make sure that you understand the impact of the services on your credit score, if any, how to enroll in the benefits, timing of alerts, and reimbursement for a stolen identity or funds.
Credit cardholder benefits should be compared against paid services to determine the cost-benefit of using the respective services.
To receive a free copy of your credit report, visit www.annualcreditreport.com. The website was created to help facilitate your right, under federal law, to receive a copy of your credit report every 12 months from each credit reporting agency.
Source: Christopher C. Shattuck – Practice Management Advisor (Practice 411™), State Bar of Wisconsin
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By the Numbers
14.5%
– The increase in the number of active lawyers in the United States, in the last decade.
At the start of 2019, there were 1.3 million active lawyers in the United States. Not surprisingly, New York and California have the most lawyers. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics projected an 8 percent increase in U.S. attorneys from 2016 to 2026.
Of all lawyers, 36 percent are women, an increase of 5 percent from 2009.
The United States experienced a 0.7 percent uptick in its lawyer population in the last year, but in Wisconsin, the lawyer population actually decreased by 0.2 percent.
However, that may change in coming years. Wisconsin’s law schools experienced a significant increase in law school applications for the 2018 academic year, as compared to 2017.
Quotable
“Remembering the not-so-good old days when women at the bar were barely seen and seldom heard, Justice Abrahamson has contributed enormously to the advancement of women’s opportunities and well-being in the legal profession.”
At her retirement celebration, Justice Abrahamson reacts to a video statement from U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
– U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Justice Ginsburg spoke in a video statement released at a June 18 retirement celebration for Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Shirley Abrahamson in the State Capitol Rotunda.
The event was co-sponsored by U.W. Law School, Marquette University Law School, and the State Bar of Wisconsin.
Abrahamson, who retires on July 31, 2019, after 43 years on the bench, spoke on the importance of an independent judiciary.
“Too much is at stake not to believe in an independent judiciary,” she said. “I still believe in it, and I hope you do as well.”
From the Archives
Belle Case La Follette: Instrumental in the Women’s Suffrage Movement
Congress passed the 19th Amendment in June 1919, and it was enacted after three-fourths of the states ratified it by August 1920. Thus, next year, 2020, marks the centennial of women’s right to vote.
Belle Case La Follette, the matriarch of the well-known political Wisconsin family, the La Follettes, was instrumental in the women’s suffrage movement .
She was the first women to graduate from the U.W. Law School, in 1885, but she never practiced law (technically). However, she “clerked” for her husband, “Fighting” Robert La Follette, a Wisconsin district attorney who went on to become a U.S. senator and Wisconsin governor (he also ran for U.S. President but lost to Calvin Coolidge).
From the 1931 archives of the Bulletin of the State Bar Association of Wisconsin, her obituary noted the story that Robert La Follette often told, how Chief Justice William P. Lyon complimented him on a brief filed before the Wisconsin Supreme Court, saying it was the best brief filed in years.
Mr. La Follette replied: “Mr. Chief Justice, you make me very proud. That brief was written by an unknown but very able member of our bar – altogether the brainiest member of my family. Mrs. La Follette wrote that brief from start to finish.”
On the Radar
E-smoking Ban in San Fran: A Sign of Things to Come?
In June, the city of San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors suspended all sales, distribution, and manufacturing of e-cigarettes in the city. In addition, e-cigarettes purchased online cannot be delivered to San Francisco addresses.
Juul Labs Inc., the top selling e-cigarette maker in the United States, is headquartered in San Francisco, but the products aren’t manufactured there.
The city supervisors unanimously imposed the moratorium in an effort to curb youth e-cigarette smoking, known as “vaping,” which has skyrocketed in recent years.
The city supervisors want the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to review the safety of e-cigarette products before they reconsider the ban. The FDA, which regulates e-cigarettes, has focused on the marketing and sales practices of e-cigarette retailers to curb appeal to minors.
The city of Beverly Hills also banned the retail sale of all tobacco products in June, starting in 2021, including e-cigarettes.
Source: L.A. Times; San Francisco Chronicle; CNBC
Out There
Not a Good Mix? AI and Job Interviews
The Illinois Legislature recently passed the Artificial Intelligence Video Review Act to implement worker protections against an emerging employment interview practice.
According to Chicago lawyer Gary Clark, “the new law targets employers that require applicants to provide a video interview and thereafter utilize AI technology to analyze the candidate's body language, speech patterns, and other characteristics to score and predict a candidate's likelihood of success at that organization.”
The law requires employers to notify candidates of their use of AI to assess candidates and to obtain written consent before applicants are required to submit the video.
The law also restricts how employers may use and share videos, and requires employers to destroy these videos within 30 days.
One problem, Clark says, is that the law does not define what constitutes AI.
“Rather than debate whether your technology constitutes real AI, the better course is to comply with this law for any technology that reviews and assesses video interviews,” wrote Clark, Quarles & Brady LLP, in a client alert.
