Key considerations for secure cloud adoption in legal enterprises

Even though the legal industry has historically been slower to adopt new technology compared to other sectors—and for good reason—the move to the cloud is nonetheless well under way.

From email to document management to client communications, legal practices are becoming more comfortable moving to the cloud. In fact, the International Legal Technology Association’s (ILTA) 2024 survey found that “more law firms are gradually welcoming technology, such as generative artificial intelligence tools, Microsoft Teams and Cloud storage.”

But although this shift will bring benefits for productivity, efficiency, and both the client and attorney experience, there are some important considerations that practices should take into account.

5 considerations for secure cloud adoption in law firms

Firms that are moving to the cloud should discuss five key topics with their solutions or technology partners as they narrow down their selection:

1) Vendor selection

Before you create a shortlist of cloud solution providers, have a clear vendor selection process—what security credentials should they have? Do they have a track record of happy customers in the legal industry? In most cases, you may even ask for a customer reference, which gives you an opportunity to have a one-on-one conversation with another law firm and understand their experience with this vendor.

Here are some questions to consider asking as your team is considering vendors:

• What security measures does your software provide?
• Do you comply with [the regulatory standards relevant to your region or country]?
• What channels is customer support available on, and what is the availability?
• Where is your data held and transported?
• Do you have other customers in the legal field that are of a comparable size to our practice, and in our geographical region?
• [If the solution has AI features] How is data handled? How will our business’ data be handled?
• What kind of security testing do you perform regularly?
• What are our data retention and deletion rights?

2) Data security and privacy

In 2024, 26% of firms cited information governance as a top challenge—compared with 21% in 2023.

With more data available than ever before, the need to have stringent security measures and encryption protocols to protect sensitive legal data is greater than ever.

According to the American Bar Association (ABA) Rule 1.6: Confidentiality of Information, lawyers should “make reasonable efforts to prevent the inadvertent or unauthorized disclosure of, or unauthorized access to, information relating to the representation of a client.”

What this means is legal practices are responsible for making reasonable efforts to protect their data, whether that’s by having a data security and privacy plan, choosing a secure cloud provider, and so on.

When adopting a cloud solution, look for data security and privacy features such as:

• End-to-end encryption (covering data at rest and data in transit)
• Multi-factor authentication 
• Single sign-on
• Role-based permissions
• Session or activity tracking

3) Regulatory compliance

On a related note, a good cloud solution can support law firms in meeting the legal industry’s compliance requirements, such as data residency and access controls.

Common regulations that cloud solutions for legal practices must adhere to in the US include:

• GDPR
• FINRA
• HIPAA
• And more

For example, depending on where a firm and its clients are located, data residency requirements would dictate where client data has to be stored. In some territories, servers storing this data must also be located in data subjects’ geographical location. 

4) Integration and customization

While integrating tools may not be the first consideration for most legal enterprises’ secure cloud adoption strategies, they’re nonetheless an important piece of the puzzle. According to the Future Ready Lawyer report, 73% of lawyers expected to integrate generative AI into their legal work before the end of 2023, and 46% of them considered the use of legal tech tools a priority.

Having a tech stack that integrates well can be a huge time saver in many ways—for one, because it reduces the need to manually copy and paste data back and forth between applications. But from a security perspective, it’s best to ensure that any cloud tools that your practice plans to integrate into your stack are themselves secure and have data privacy features built in.

For example, RingCentral’s communication platform integrates with other popular legal technology such as Clio, MagicTime by LawGro, and Smokeball:

5) Risk management

Beyond a law firm’s own data, there are other data security risks to consider, including “the valuable information they hold, such as trade secrets, intellectual property, personally identifiable information (PII), and confidential attorney-client-privileged data.” 

A comprehensive risk assessment strategy is essential for identifying and mitigating potential threats associated with cloud adoption, and should cover key areas such as:

• Data storage and migration
• Vendor selection and security
• Vulnerabilities and potential security gaps
• Commitments to ongoing monitoring for threats

Learn how to stay secure and compliant with RingCentral’s AI communications platform

Beyond establishing strong internal data security policies, choosing the right cloud vendor can help alleviate the burden for your internal IT security team. 

From security controls such as secure video meetings and identity management, to certifications such as HITRUST and SOC 2+, there are numerous factors to consider when adopting a new cloud solution.

Book a demo with our team to learn more about how legal enterprises are using RingCentral’s AI-powered communications solutions to serve clients more effectively while providing a better attorney experience.

Originally published Jan 29, 2025