Access to Justice ("A2J") Technology and Implications in Hong Kong

The Mingpao newspaper 明報新聞 in Hong Kong recently published my comments in Chinese on the role of digital technologies in enhancing access to justice. 

In the interview with Mingpao, I highlighted multiple areas of the legal system where digital technologies could readily address gaps of access to justice. These gaps exclude underprivileged members of society from accessing lawyers, legal services, and legal knowhow because of issues concerning affordability, availability, and intelligibility of resources. I also gave examples of the wonderful work done by probono.net and other pro bono and low cost online resources to demonstrate how technologies are enhancing access to justice around the world.

According to reports from the US Legal Services Corporation (one of the primary legal aid bodies of the US), investment in simple online resources have shown great returns and positive impact on access to justice. These resources could allow pro bono and low cost legal resources to be scaled and maximised in utility. In the article, I mentioned the implications in the Hong Kong context and how technologies could be used to fill the gaps of access locally, and what is needed now to push forward technology development to enhance access to justice. 

I spoke on the same topic recently at DragonCon in Hong Kong (at the kind invitation by Ryanne Lai). It was one of the first larger scale gatherings of the LegalTech community in Hong Kong. A number of attendees, both lawyers and technologists, spoke with me after my presentation and said they were very supportive of the development of access to justice technologies in Hong Kong.

I believe that orienting LegalTech around access to justice goals gives substantive meaning to law and technology and helps discharge legal professional duties and the administration of justice within the digital environment.