Know What's Happening in Legal
Know What's Happening in Legal
Delaware Supreme Court lets insurers pursue contract claims against Blackbaud over ransomware breach
The Delaware Supreme Court reversed lower‑court dismissals, permitting insurers to bring breach‑of‑contract actions against Blackbaud for its 2020 ransomware incident. Blackbaud had previously paid a $3 million SEC fine and $49 million to state attorneys general for misleading breach disclosures.
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By the numbers: Oil majors acquire $164M of Alaska oil leases
Latitude59 has opened applications for its 2026 pitch competition, with a deadline of April 15, 2026. The event will take place May 20‑22 in Tallinn, featuring jurors, mentors, and regional angel networks. Last year attracted 407 applications from 48 countries, highlighting its growing role as a gateway to the New Nordics. Winners gain exposure, potential capital, and access to a three‑stage selection process culminating on the main stage.
The real question isn't whether AI changes legal work. It's whether lawyers use this moment to finally define themselves by what only they can do.
White & Case LLP has bolstered its Global Litigation Practice by adding Jeffrey Steinfeld as a partner in Los Angeles. Steinfeld is a first‑chair trial and appellate lawyer renowned for securities litigation, corporate governance, and white‑collar defense. He has led...
A CMBS trust has sued Starwood Mortgage Capital over a $54.5 million loan that was allegedly secured by a parking garage deemed unsafe. The trust claims Starwood misrepresented the collateral as free of material damage, despite a 2021 safety report and...
Bloomberg argues that U.S. prediction markets operate without a clear federal framework, exposing traders to manipulation similar to unregulated gambling. It calls on Congress to amend the 1936 Commodity Exchange Act to define event contracts, separating legitimate market-driven bets from...
Two Texas-licensed real‑estate agents, Christopher Aldridge and Harry Gibbs, organized an $850,000 private syndication to buy a 5.057‑acre parcel in Jarrell, Texas, while secretly holding an undisclosed interest in the land. The investors allege the agents failed to disclose the...
The article examines the surge of AI‑generated hallucination cases in U.S. courts, noting that out of roughly 982 documented incidents, only 257 are solely attributable to lawyers while pro se litigants account for about 412. It references the Fifth Circuit’s recent...
The Trump administration, led by Treasury officials Paul Atkins and Selig, is drafting the first U.S. crypto framework that explicitly addresses decentralized finance. The proposed rules would let major exchanges such as Kraken, Coinbase and Crypto.com register with a federal...
Bradley Law is expanding its Government Enforcement & Investigations practice by hiring partner Scott F. Mascianica in Dallas and counsel Andrew Bastnagel in Washington, D.C. Both attorneys come from Hilgers PLLC, where Mascianica led the firm’s enforcement practice. The hires...
Estate planners often market "avoiding probate" as the ultimate goal, but probate is a statutory process that provides essential legal authority and asset verification. Even well‑structured plans can encounter probate due to post‑plan asset acquisitions, digital holdings, or out‑of‑state property....
The Legal IT Insider report released on March 9 examines whether generative‑AI‑driven Human AI‑Assisted Review (HAR) can be validated under the traditional Technology‑Assisted Review (TAR) framework. Interviews with judges, scholars and leading e‑discovery providers reveal that applying existing TAR validation to...
Njordium Cyber Group unveiled its Vendor Management System (VMS), a platform that consolidates third‑party risk assessments to satisfy Europe’s overlapping regulations in a single run. The solution claims to replace up to five parallel assessments with one, automatically generating outputs...
NetDocuments unveiled Smart Answers, an AI‑driven search tool that interprets natural‑language queries to retrieve the most relevant documents from a firm’s repository. The solution leverages large language models to rank results and surface contextual excerpts, cutting retrieval time dramatically. It...
Annie Lespérance, head of the Americas at Jus Mundi and recent Monica Bay Women of Legal Tech award winner, highlighted a surge in cross‑border legal‑tech adoption across Latin America. She emphasized that clients increasingly demand platforms that operate in multiple...
HaystackID vice president Laura Danielson identified fragmentation and confidence gaps as the primary obstacles to legal‑tech innovation. She explained that disparate tools and unclear data reliability discourage adoption among corporate legal departments. Danielson emphasized that modern legal users demand seamless...
Labour backbencher Mike Reader has tabled the Geotechnical Data Bill, requiring parties that conduct ground investigations to upload factual borehole logs, soil tests and site reports to the National Underground Asset Register (NUAR). The measure builds on NUAR’s existing utility‑mapping...
AltaGas and Royal Vopak’s $1.35 billion REEF propane terminal, now 70 % complete at the Port of Prince Rupert, would add roughly 20 percent of Canada’s propane and butane export capacity. The Metlakatla First Nation has withdrawn its support and filed a lawsuit...
The OpenID Foundation released a report urging the creation of a global digital‑estate framework to protect deceased users’ online accounts. It warns that the absence of consistent standards leaves devices, social media, email and cryptocurrency vulnerable to fraud, especially as...
Retail brands face heightened scrutiny in 2026 as the UK Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) wields expanded powers under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024. Greenwashing can also be prosecuted as a criminal offence under the Economic Crime...
Law firm Lieff Cabraser is probing Kalshi over its "Ali Khamenei out as Supreme Leader" prediction market, which generated over $50 million in volume before being halted. Kalshi invoked a contractual "death carve‑out" clause, settling contracts at the last price prior...
The Senate is advancing a bipartisan housing bill that would bar institutional investors from holding rental single‑family homes longer than seven years, requiring them to sell any newly built units to individuals. The proposal, championed by President Trump, Senate Banking...
A UK court just ruled: security duties don't disappear even if hackers can't read what they stole. The breach itself is the violation. Meanwhile, GDPR surged 220% in a single day. Privacy isn't a checkbox anymore. It's becoming infrastructure. https://t.co/uNnssaoO6P
Legal tech experts discussed modernising case management systems (CMS) as firms face performance bottlenecks, hybrid‑work demands, and AI ambitions. 2026 is seen as a turning point, with firms weighing optimisation, SaaS migration, or workflow redesign. Lima’s assessment combines technical diagnostics...
U.S. law firm Husch Blackwell has rolled out the Legora generative‑AI platform firm‑wide, adding AI‑driven document review, research and workflow automation. Legal‑tech startup Harvey bolstered its advisory team with three senior innovation partners from Ashurst, Marsh McLennan and Fasken to...
A VinciWorks survey of 230 compliance, legal and IT professionals reveals that only 3.5% of organisations feel fully prepared for the emerging AI regulatory regime. More than three‑quarters lack effective AI‑specific training, and 63% cannot describe their current preparedness. GDPR...
Malaysia’s Arbitration (Amendment) Act 2024 took effect on 1 January 2026, formally legalising third‑party funding in arbitration. The law carves out funding from the historic champerty doctrine and imposes a light‑touch disclosure regime, requiring funded parties to reveal the existence of a funder...
On February 13, 2026, Magistrate Judge Chris M. Stephens recommended that the court deny the plaintiff’s motion to dismiss in Miller v. GEO Group Inc., case 25‑724. The recommendation was adopted on March 2, 2026, when Chief Judge Timothy D. DeGiusti entered an order formally denying the motion. The...
On March 2, 2026, the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma granted Defendant National Consumer Telecommunications and Utility Exchange, Inc.'s motion to dismiss the lawsuit filed by Dotson. The court applied Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6)...
The European Union’s revised anti‑money‑laundering (AML) and counter‑terrorist financing framework transfers crime‑detection duties from public authorities to private banks and other obliged entities. By mandating extensive collection of personal and transactional data, the rules compel institutions to flag customers as...
The UK Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has banned British Gas and Centrica Hive ads that promoted green‑energy savings, finding the claims misleading and insufficiently substantiated. British Gas advertised up to £546 savings from a heat‑pump tariff, yet ASA’s model showed...
Law firms face a perfect storm of compliance obstacles—policy gaps, tick‑box culture, and fragmented legacy technology—that make risk assessments cumbersome. The SRA’s systematic requirements clash with offline templates, leaving firms without clear digital processes. Modern tools such as biometrics, open‑banking...
Ross McNairn, CEO of Wordsmith, argues that legal‑tech firms cannot simultaneously serve law firms and in‑house legal departments because of an inherent conflict of interest. He announces Wordsmith will focus exclusively on the in‑house market, positioning the company against competitors...
American Arbitration Association introduced the Resolution Simulator, an AI‑powered tool that generates simulated, non‑binding arbitration decisions for document‑only commercial and construction disputes. Building on its 2024 AI Arbitrator pilot, the platform analyzes uploaded pleadings, contracts, and evidence using large‑language models...
Zimbabwe's Cabinet approved a new legislative framework that moves beyond the 2024 ban on alluvial river‑bed mining to active ecosystem rehabilitation. The Inter‑Ministerial Committee reported that mechanised mining has largely ceased, while enforcement actions have led to over 300 arrests...
In this episode Stuart Watson talks with Reed Smith partner Josh Hughes and Knight Frank associate Jess Qureshi about back leverage – the practice of borrowing to fund existing debt – and its rapid rise in European real‑estate finance. They...
Georgia’s House passed HB 1344, a sweeping insurance reform moving to the Senate, targeting lower premiums and stronger consumer protections. The bill raises fines for insurers and auto‑fraud perpetrators, expands the insurance commissioner’s investigative powers, and creates a $6,000 matching...
U.S. District Judge Analisa Torres ruled that American Transit Insurance Co. (ATIC) breached its duty to defend Uber Technologies in 23 crash lawsuits, ordering the insurer to pay damages and Uber’s legal fees. ATIC, New York’s largest taxi insurer, has...
A Madrid investigating court has summoned Cloudflare chief executive Matthew Prince to appear on April 7th over alleged non‑cooperation with Spain’s anti‑piracy efforts. LaLiga and Movistar Plus+ claim the U.S. firm ignored more than a hundred takedown requests, allowing roughly 38 percent of...
Queensland's government has abolished the Mine Safety Commissioner role, transferring its statutory duties to other agencies, despite an independent review urging retention of the position. The move contravenes advice from Resources Safety and Health Queensland, raising concerns over regulatory oversight....
During the Supreme Court’s Hemani oral argument, Justice Kagan posed a hypothetical that a user of ayahuasca—a hallucinogenic tea protected under the 2006 *Gonzales v. O Centro* decision—could be barred from firearm ownership. The scenario pits a religious‑freedom exemption granted...
Enforcement actions by the SEC and PCAOB dropped sharply in 2025, with the SEC filing 68% fewer accounting cases and the PCAOB finalizing 27% fewer audits than in 2024. The SEC launched only ten actions, the lowest in nine years,...
The Fair Work Commission ruled that dismissing a WorkSafe Victoria inspector was fair because medical evidence indicated his post‑traumatic stress disorder was likely permanent. Commissioner Emma Thornton accepted that the employee’s capacity to perform any role was doubtful, removing the...
The U.S. Trade Representative released its 2025 Notorious Markets List, identifying 37 online and 32 physical venues that facilitate trademark counterfeiting and copyright piracy. The report spotlights the surge in illegal streaming of live sports, especially as the United States...
The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has asked the Attorney General for legal guidance on how to handle adjusted gross revenue (AGR) dues of insolvent telcos Reliance Communications and Aircel after the Supreme Court ruled that spectrum cannot be transferred or...
The Justice Department abruptly reversed its decision to drop appeals defending executive orders that sanction law firms, re‑asserting its position within 24 hours. The reversal follows a brief announcement that the Trump administration would cease defending the orders, which targeted...
Anthony Lewis, a blind San Francisco resident, sued the city after a library security guard demanded his service dog’s rabies vaccination record. The U.S. Magistrate Judge Joseph Spero declined to dismiss Lewis’s ADA discrimination claim, allowing the case to move forward....
A Texas mother has asked the Fifth Circuit to revive a lawsuit against Dr. Aaron Shaw, the former medical director of Tarrant County Jail, alleging deliberate indifference after her daughter, Chasity Congious, gave birth alone in her cell and the...
"The National Labor Relations Board has approximately 17,000 open unfair labor practice investigations on hand, including almost 10,000 cases that have been pending review for more than six months" https://t.co/m5FQS4iHKl @robertiafolla
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and SAMHSA issued a February 2024 Final Rule that modernizes 42 C.F.R. Part 2, aligning substance‑use‑disorder (SUD) privacy with HIPAA while preserving heightened protections. Effective February 16 2026, the rule permits a single written consent for all treatment,...
A federal judge largely dismissed a lawsuit filed by women’s volleyball players seeking to stop the Mountain West Conference from allowing transgender athletes in championship matches. The court noted the NCAA’s 2025 rule now bars athletes assigned male at birth...
