In the Know: Top 5 Legal Technology Trends for the 2020s

Through Web 3.0, marketers will better understand consumption, buying, and specific user behavior. Web 3.0 makes it easy for marketers to segment and target their customers more specifically providing them with a more personalized experience. Consumers will be re-directed to most relevant results specific to their needs with Web 3.0 acting as their personal assistant.

4. 5G Cellular Networks

5G is the next generation of mobile broadband that will eventually replace, or at least augment your 4G LTE connection. With 5G, you'll see exponentially faster download and upload speeds. Latency, or the time it takes devices to communicate with wireless networks will drastically decrease. All major carriers have launched some form of a 5G network is some cities, but like 4G, will take some time before we see the full benefits.

What does 5G mean for the legal industry? The rollout of 5G over the next several years will likely prompt legal challenges and legislative actions involving licensing, property rights, patent claims, privacy, cybersecurity, health concerns and other issues. City council members in Mill Valley, a small town north of San Francisco, voted unanimously last year to block 5G small cell towers in residential areas after getting significant pushback from the people living there. The concern was over potential health hazards posed by 5G technology.

Legal assistance will be required to address new liability and regulatory consideration by activities made possible by 5G such as:

• Autonomous vehicles;
• Robot doctors;
• Remote healthcare (including surgery);
• Virtual and augmented reality; and
• Universal surveillance.

5. Human Augmentation

Human augmentation refers to the use of technology to improve the cognitive and physical experiences of humans. There are two types of augmentation — physical and cognitive.

Physical augmentation alters the person's inherent physical capability by implanting or hosting a technology within their bodies. There are four categories:

1. Sensory augmentation: Involves hearing, vision, and perception. Examples include virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), and mixed reality (MR).
2. Appendage and biological function augmentation: Used to replace or enhance such capabilities. LASIK surgery and cochlear implants are examples.
3. Brain augmentation: Brain implants are being used to treat seizures. They are also being used for memory storage, decoding neural patterns, and synthesizing speech.
4. Genetic augmentation: Somatic gene and cell therapies are used to treat children with severe combined immune therapy. CRISPR technologies can be used to tinker with our DNA to improve traits like intelligence, athleticism, and even moral reasoning.

Cognitive augmentation improves the human thought and decision-making process. It involves physical implants that deal with cognitive reasoning and includes augmented intelligence scenarios where humans and AI work together to enhance cognitive performance.

While this has an element of sci-fi to it, this is all very real and we're likely to see more advances in the next decade. In 2006, a Cincinnati surveillance firm required all employees working in its secure data center to have RFIDs implanted in their triceps. Three Square Market employees volunteered to have a RFID injected into their hand in 2017 to make it easier to get into the office, log into their computers, and buy food and drinks in the company cafeteria.

Organizations looking to implement human augmentation technologies need to be aware of:

• Security risks;
• Privacy issues;
• Compliance issues;
• Health impact; and
• Ethical issues.

Key Takeaways

• Law firms will need to have lawyers educated on these technologies to understand the impact on their clients to help guide them through any potential legal issues.
• Legal marketers, especially legal marketing technologists, should have a basic understanding of technology trends to help educate the lawyers on the potential impact to their clients and identify business development opportunities.

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Deb Dobson is the Marketing Technology Manager at Fisher Phillips. She can be reached at [email protected]. Connect via LinkedIn or follow her on Twitter @debdobson.