As a user of legal services, I find that I must place myself into a time machine and venture back to an era where rooms are laden with hardwood panels and endless rows of fine, leather bound volumes. However, once I snap out of this reverie of almost timeless traditional, my real concerns are usually focused upon more practical concerns:
- The presentation of the impending process in a consistent, logical and easily understood and accessed representation.
- The sharing of outcomes responsibility by all parties to the transaction based upon an agreed, secure archive shared and easily accessed by all parties.
- The endorsement of all transactional processes by all parties to the transaction, not a singular group of elite legal arbiters.
- The rebalancing of trust equities where all parties to the transaction are valued and their contributions inputted with the same level of veracity and inviolability.
- A face-paced, cost-effective process.
Technology has most certainly had a very positive impact on many aspects of the legal sector: margin growth, higher throughput, better client communications and the ability to easily archive and protect high value and mission critical processes.
As an irregular user of both personal and business legal services – and as expected – always in conjunction with other sectors covering the entire gamut of human activity: buyers, sellers, litigants, regulators, customers, contractors, citizens, friends, family and enemies, I find the “legal process” as a mystical land from which I am sometimes forcibly removed – intellectually, ethically and spiritually. Let the maestro complete the aria and then we can all sit down and listen to their brilliance in a foreign tongue – a most enjoyable experience – albeit for most – without nuance!
Given the life changing importance and impact of many legal processes, this lack of transparency and transactional equities is most disconcerting, but for those with an eye to the future – an opportunity to retain and gain custom.
4Trust’s Chain of Custody is NOT a smart contract, it does not change proven processes and precepts. It does NOT throw out centuries of judicial outcomes and it does NOT take short cuts.
Chain of Custody takes all of the key documents, contracts, judgments, regulations, terms and conditions, outside expertise and opinions - and immutably records these data points in a distributed, transparent ledger or blockchain. These data points remain in their current secure, PRIVATE, data archives, however, the DLT records:
- their existence and location;
- their agreed participation and relevance to the specific chain of custody;
- their logging and entry into the chain of custody as an encrypted hash;
- their authorization by all members of the chain of custody as being relevant to performance, compliance and finality;
- their accessibility to members of the chain of custody based upon agreed permission hierarchy.
4Trust describes, defines and records a mutually agreed path to the best outcomes for all stakeholders and prevents deviations, short cuts, amendments to best practice – unless recorded in the chain of custody – and agreed by consensually appointed decision makers.
It does not take away decision making powers from legal professionals, regulators, courts or any parties to the transaction – it just ensures that the agreed “pathway to the rule of law” was followed and that all changes, oversights and deviations from agreed pathways are recorded.
It restores and protects equities for all stakeholders.
This is especially valuable for high-volume, uncontested transactions where processes and expectations are in concert; and for supporting high-value litigation.
Martin Ruda, Group Managing Director of the TALL Group of Companies said: “The TALL Group has long been recognized as the UK’s trusted partner for secure documents and credentialing and has now introduced DocuChain’s 4Trust Chain of Custody platform to the UK, Eire and other international markets. TALL’s 4Trust cloud-based portal records and authenticates processes, people and performance on a blockchain infrastructure.”
Leveraging decades of experience and innovation, the TALL Group understands today’s dynamic environment that is so increasingly dependent on authenticity and traceability of data held in disparate locations to underpin business performance, regulatory compliance and litigation.
TALL’s 4Trust Chain of Custody – under license from DocuChain Limited, an UK-based software developer and licensor recognizes and resolves a large performance gap in legacy trust systems at the point where secure documents and artefacts meet data archives. Enterprises and government are unable to verify in real time the authenticity of processes and documents by directly linking them to their respective secure archives.
TALL has resolved the requirement to link the physical world to the logical world in real time using Android, iOS and Windows applications that link the 4Trust Chain of Custody artefact (a polymer document with a 2K encrypted NFC gateway) to the blockchain archive of the chain of custody.
Today, most issued artefacts (documents) and associated processes that provide the foundation of performance and compliance are not truly secure or immutable, and perhaps more importantly, neither the artefact(s) nor its holder(s) can be validated as authentic in real time.
Conclusions
The legal profession has many high-volume, high-value services that require the rigour, process, immutability and accessibility of 4Trust’s Chain of Custody.- The automation of these services into blockchain infrastructures removes inconsistencies in practise, lowers costs of delivery and improves the quality and timeliness of service.
- 4Trust allows for professional discretion, but all deviations from agreed pathways are recorded and shared – and therefore – protect your clients.
- The secure and encrypted archives allow for the long term immutability and retention of data that cannot be disputed.
- Clients, Providers and Regulators cannot dispute a mutually agreed and mutually constructed chain of custody and to which they have real time access using mobile and desk top applications.
- Your firm and your clients have access to the right document, to the right data, at the right time and at the right place with the right level of security in a single domain.
- The 4Trust legal Artefact is an intelligent gateway to their Chain of Custody – which separates your firm from those who take a more Dickensian approach to trust and equities!
Philip Leone, the CEO and co-founder of DocuChain says: “4Trust has re-invented trust and custody. 4Trust’s Chain of Custody is fully transparent and immutable; allows real time professional and regulatory oversight; and stands up to forensic audit by providing links between both physical and logical documents and their associated logical processes in a singular performance and regulatory domain.”
Many legal processes such as property conveyance, wills and estate planning, trusts, powers of attorney, tenancy and consumer and small claims lend themselves to chains of custody.
For Further Information, please contact Lynton Buxton, Group Marketing Manager
The TALL Group of Companies, Mobile: 07534 789143, DDI: 01455 623702
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