A great deal of attention has recently been given to blockchain applications and their ability to deliver access to justice. Posted recently on LTN was From Nigeria to Brazil to Canada: Access to Justice Tech on the International Stage, which reveals how blockchain and other legal tech applications developed at the Global Legal Hackathon 2018 address access to justice issues on a global scale.

The capacity of legal technology to deliver legal services “better, faster and cheaper” is beginning to catch the attention of the legal, technology and investment communities. This is a very good thing.

This year especially has seen law firm accelerators, incubators and investment strategies deployed for legal technology acquisition and use. Implementation can be a significant hurdle if the law firm or legal department has not carefully planned an implementation strategy built for success. It won't happen by itself. Change requires a strategic reason that users can identify as in their best interest or change won't occur because it is demanded or expected. Technology acquisition without a careful developed implementation plant is wasting money for no good reason.

Steve Jobs said it well, “Technology is not the solution, people are.” A technology strategy must begin with a people strategy. “What is the problem you are trying to solve?” Is the mantra of legal design thinking and legal project management that is somewhat foreign to the lawyer mindset. We are urgent, abstract thinkers with little patience for process or the potential for failure. If these traits are planned for, implementation won't happen.

Use cases are the essence of a technology implementation. Finding the reason for technology adoption and how it can be deployed is essential in legal as in every other industry.

An example of a blockchain technology use case is currently under development by the Internet Bar Organization (IBO). Operating in a synchronistic fashion the IBO and several related technology companies are addressing the current outreach to the Rohingya refugees, who number about 700,000 and are confined to a single camp in Bangladesh. Among them are doctors, lawyers, professors and teachers, along with many agrarian manual laborers without identity, credentials or economic value.

PeaceTones.org has captured the Rohingya narrative in their own language, melody and rhythms at: Is The Lady Listening. This is a music video produced to tell their story in an original song (with English subtitles) and actual footage recounting the state of the Rohingya people living in exile.

The IBO has developed a coordinated approach to bring existing technologies together and launch a world relief operation, first for the Rohingya, and then for the invisibles in every community on a project-by-project basis. Kenyan refugees, displaced people in Haiti, homeless in Nashville, Tennessee and your town can be given a sovereign internet identity with blockchain technology. Verifiable biometric claim technology can insure that a person is who she claims to be. Cybercurrency and lost public credentials (digital educational and professional documentation) can be obtained and deposited in secure digital wallets for each individual who chooses to live and maintain their digital valuables in a virtual and sovereign secure fashion.

For the Rohingya people this is not a luxury, but a necessity. Later this summer, monsoon season will descend upon Bangladesh and the Rohingya refugee camp will be at peril of washing down the mountainside. Illness and disease are sure to follow. These people need sovereign identities and digital value now, not after this ensuing disaster.

This threat to the Rohingya people is not theoretical, but real. Just as real as the technology solutions that can act in an interoperable fashion to exchange and retain the life-giving data in real time and across multiple technologies to benefit real people through emerging blockchain applications.

The Internet Bar is working with technology companies collaboratively to create this internet layer of justice. Possible partners include Sovrin (identity and cryptocurrency), Odem (educational support services and cryptocurrency), Leaf (refugee digital wallet), TransendeX (biometric claim verification), Vipo (identity, claim verification, IBM Cognitive Legal, and LegalAlignment (interoperable legal productivity tools.)

For more information or to join in the blockchain rescue of the Rohingya people go to: IBO Rohingya Rescue. With the proper purpose and use case, we can distribute justice at a very basic level.

 

Larry Bridgesmith is an Adjunct Professor and the Program on Law & Innovation Coordinator at Vanderbilt Law School.