ABA launches website to aid unaccompanied minors (VOXXI, 14 Nov 2014) – Child advocates have for months voiced concerns about unaccompanied minors not having an attorney by their side in immigration court, and now the American Bar Association is stepping in to help. The group launched a website this week as a resource for attorneys who want to volunteer their time to help unaccompanied minors navigate through the immigration system. The goal is to get more attorneys to provide unaccompanied minors with legal representation on a pro bono basis. “The ABA steps up when justice is at stake,” American Bar Association President William C. Hubbard said in a statement. “We support legal representation for unaccompanied children in the U.S. immigration court system. We are acting not only out of concern for the welfare of these children, but also because all parties benefit when vulnerable children are competently represented by counsel in adversarial proceedings.” The website is dubbed the Immigrant Child Advocacy Network . It was put together by the American Bar Association’s working group on unaccompanied minors in collaboration with partner organizations, like Kids in Need of Defense and the American Immigration Lawyers Association. The website provides links to resources and training materials on issues related to legal representation of children. It also provides a calendar of ongoing pro bono training opportunities and a list of legal providers who are looking for volunteers to assist children.

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Apple says iOS 8 update keeps data private, even from the police (NYT, 17 Sept 2014) – Apple wants to make clear that it wants nobody snooping around in your device, not even the police. The company said Wednesday night that its latest software system, iOS 8, included deep protection of the information stored on Apple mobile devices. So deep, in fact, that Apple says it has become technically impossible for it to comply with government warrants asking for customer information like photos, email, messages, contacts, call history and notes, to be extracted from devices. The company said all this information was under the protection of a customer’s passcode, the four-digit number used to log in to the device. In the past, Apple was able to extract certain types of information from devices, even when they were locked with a passcode, in response to a valid search warrant. The new security in iOS 8 protects information stored on the device itself, but not data stored on Apple’s cloud service. So Apple will still be able to hand over some customer information stored on iCloud in response to government requests. Christopher Soghoian, a principal technologist for the American Civil Liberties Union, said Apple’s new privacy policy reflected the revelations of the government surveillance programs revealed in documents leaked by Edward J. Snowden. “The public has said they want companies to put their privacy first, and Apple has listened,” Mr. Soghoian said.

From MIRLN founder, Vince Polley:

[ Polley : but then a flurry of “warrant canary” stories, about whether or not Apple has been using a canary– Apple’s “warrant canary” disappears, suggesting new Patriot Act demands (GigaOM, 18 Sept 2014); and No, Apple probably didn’t get new secret gov’t orders to hand over data (ArsTechnica, 18 Sept 2014). Finally, a paper recommended by Chris Soghoian: Warrant Canaries as Tools For Transparency in the Wake of the Snowden Disclosures (SSNR by Naomi Gilens, April 2014) ]

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Should lawyers look to online dispute resolution to resolve disputes with clients? (Carolyn Elefant, 5 Sept 2014) – Online dispute resolution is rapidly gaining traction. Modria , a leading online dispute resolution (ODR) platform, boasts that its service is used to settle more than 60 million cases annually. Yet even though ABA task forces have studied, and appear to endorse ODR, I’ve not found much mention of the potential uses of ODR to resolve disputes between lawyers and clients. Currently, in most state ethics codes , lawyers may include binding arbitration clauses in representation agreements resolution of legal malpractice disputes . But should lawyers consider including ODR clauses instead – not necessarily as binding requirements but perhaps as prerequisites to litigation. Consumers are already familiar with the ODR process as its used widely in e-commerce, so they would understand the need to adequately documenting their claims. And while granted, the relative ease of ODR could invite groundless fee disputes from clients, that’s probably preferable to posting negative reviews or filing a grievance. Attorneys could benefit from ODR also, using it to attempt to collect debts owed from clients. I realize that going after fees always raises the prospect of malpractice or a grievance, but because ODR is less intimidating than a court process, perhaps clients would be less likely to retaliate. Or not – this may be purely wishful thinking. And even if attorneys don’t make the option of ODR available through participation in a third party service, bar associations could offer online fee dispute resolution. Many bars offer this service already but ODR would make it faster and more efficient as well.

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‘Hackcess to Justice’ winners look to increase the reach of their apps (ABA Journal, 25 August 2014) – Award winners from the recent Hackcess to Justice legal hackathon are working hard to fulfill the main goal of the event: Improving access for all Americans to effective legal assistance. In the two weeks since the inaugural hackathon-in conjunction with the ABA Annual Meeting-took place at Suffolk University Law School in Boston, the programmers and lawyers behind the three winning entries have hardly sat back and rested on their laurels. Instead, they have all taken steps to try and increase the reach of their apps. For instance, all three apps are now available for the general public to use, and in some cases, the prize winners are speaking to nonprofit and state agencies to figure out ways their apps can be used to provide legal assistance to many more individuals. William Palin, a Somerville, Massachusetts, attorney who won first place with his health care proxy and living will generator PaperHealth , tells the ABA Journal that the app has already been approved by Apple and is now available in the App Store . He says that he is currently talking to a nonprofit legal network in Vermont in the hopes of increasing awareness of his app. “What I’m proposing is that, if the state will provide an attorney to review the legality of the app, then I’ll adjust and customize it for the state, and then provide it for free, as long as they promote it,” says Palin, who hopes to do this with every state in the country. The second-place winning app, disastr , which was created by Matthew Burnett, director of the Immigration Advocates Network, and Adam Friedl, program and special initiatives manager at Pro Bono Net, has been officially released for Android. The app provides information, resources, real-time news and alerts and legal representation forms for people affected by natural disasters Meanwhile, David Colarusso, staff attorney for the Massachusetts Committee for Public Counsel Services, has been busy talking to state officials about potential uses for his team’s app, Due Processr . The app, which took third place and was developed by Colarusso and his teammates, David Zvenyach, a general counsel in Washington, D.C. and William Li, a computer science PhD student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Hotmail.is an interactive tool that allows users to determine their eligibility for indigent legal services in Massachusetts, and for criminal defendants to calculate their state prison sentences.

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