Extract from Jim Gill’s article “What is Shadow IT and Why Your Legal Team Should Be Concerned”
Before the COVID-19 Pandemic, legal technology writers like myself, wrote about BYOD (an acronym for Bring Your Own Device) policies and how they affect the eDiscovery process. But since March 2020 and the great migration from offices and law firms to kitchens and spare bedrooms, BYOD has morphed into what is being called Shadow IT.
What is Shadow IT?
Shadow IT is nothing new really, but the move to remote work exacerbated the risks that were already there. Shadow IT is a term which defines all of the technology and communication platforms members of an organization are using outside of the organization’s known IT resources.
This should be no surprise to anyone. With the rise of free or affordable SaaS offerings, it’s now easier than ever for teams, departments, and individuals to use tools outside of their organization’s approved list. One person may use their own project management, communication, graphic design, and video editing tools, and a peer on the same team may use a different set of the same tools, all while their company computers are loaded with a third set of tools its IT department approved. And this doesn’t include the tools employees may be using on their mobile devices or the personal email accounts and collaboration apps which may also be used for business purposes.
