The Oklahoma Bar Journal October 2026

L aw P ractice T ips

Who Has the Keys to Your Law Firm’s Technology? Why Lawyers Need to Maintain Control of Their Firm’s Accounts, Credentials and Data

By Julie Bays

M OST LAWYERS WOULD never allow an outside bookkeeper to be the only person who could access the firm’s bank accounts. The bookkeeper may handle the day-to-day work, but the lawyer understands that the accounts belong to the firm and that the firm must retain ultimate control. Technology should be treated the same way. Your law firm may pay every technology bill. You may own the computers sitting on the desks. You may pay monthly subscrip tions for Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace, practice management software, cloud storage, your telephone system and numerous other services. But if the person or company managing your technol ogy disappears tomorrow, could you get into all of them? PAYING FOR IT IS NOT THE SAME AS CONTROLLING IT Modern law offices depend on technology for almost every part of practice. Client intake, email, doc ument management, calendaring, billing, telephone service, electronic filing and remote work all depend on systems that may exist some where outside the physical law office.

may be able to add or remove users, reset passwords, change settings, modify security controls or manage subscriptions. Your IT provider may use admin istrative credentials every day. That may be entirely appropriate. But your IT provider should not necessarily be the only party that possesses them. The same principle applies to important technology accounts. The firm should retain a securely stored administrative or emergency- access account controlled by the firm rather than solely by an out side vendor. If a relationship with a technol ogy provider ends unexpectedly, the firm should not have to negoti ate for access to its own systems. If you want to conduct a tech nology ownership audit, one of the best places to begin is your inter net domain. Many lawyers give little thought to domain registration after the firm’s website has been established. But the domain may be one of the most important digi tal assets the firm owns. START WITH YOUR DOMAIN NAME

That arrangement is not inher ently a problem. Most law firms need outside vendors and tech nology professionals to operate efficiently and securely. The problem arises when the firm gives away control without realizing it. This often happens innocently. A lawyer opens a prac tice and hires someone to build a website. The web designer registers the domain name. An IT consultant sets up Microsoft 365. Someone else installs the telephone system. An employee creates the firm’s social media accounts. A vendor establishes a backup service. Five or 10 years later, nobody remembers who created what. The lawyer may be paying for the technology while someone else remains the registered owner, administrator or recovery con tact. The firm still needs a way to regain control if ordinary access fails. Every law firm should know where the spare keys are. ADMINISTRATIVE ACCESS IS THE SPARE KEY An administrator account has higher-level authority than an ordinary user account. Depending on the system, an administrator

86 | OCTOBER 2026

THE OKLAHOMA BAR JOURNAL