realLegal.com Announces Electronic Transcript Signatures With e-transcript Manager 3.5; Certified Transcripts Can Now be Sent Securely over the Internet.

Business Editors/High-Tech & Legal Writers

LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 20, 2000

LegalTech Show-- Denver-based realLegal.com(TM), a law.com company and the leader in virtual transcript applications for the legal industry, announced today the release of Electronic Transcript Signatures in e-transcript Manager 3.5(TM) -- the only digital transcript software with the exclusive endorsement of the National Court Reporters Association Service Corporation (NCRASC).

realLegal.com's new electronic transcript signature technology replaces the traditional paper-based methods of attaching a certification page containing the court reporter's signature to a trial or deposition transcript. realLegal.com Electronic Transcript Signatures are integrated with realLegal.com's e-transcript Manager 3.5, which will be available for download starting today.

"Court reporters can distinguish themselves by providing their clients with transcripts that contain secure, verifiable electronic transcript signatures, and they can do it in a fraction of the time taken by traditional signature methods," said realLegal.com CEO Marty Steinberg. "And because electronic transcripts do not require printing, binding or shipping, court reporters can turn their time savings into cost savings as well, charging their clients a reasonable price for the convenience of a secure electronic transcript."

With e-transcript Manager 3.5 and a realLegal.com Electronic Transcript Signature account, court reporters can send secure and verifiable electronic signatures embedded in their electronic transcripts via e-mail or on diskette.

"Court reporters everywhere will applaud the advent of real-time electronic signatures," said Carl Sauceda, President of the National Court Reporters Association. "This step forward in technology by realLegal.com will eliminate the many steps involved in certifying, notarizing and manually sending hard-copy transcripts from the court reporter to its clients."

How Electronic Transcript Signature Technology Works

After establishing an Electronic Transcript Signature account with realLegal.com at http://www.realLegal.com/esig.asp, a court reporter needs e-transcript Manager 3.5 (the upgrade is FREE for e-transcript 3.0 users), Internet access and a Version 4 Web browser (i.e. Netscape 4.x, Internet Explorer 4.0x or later) to electronically sign and send an e-transcript.

When a court reporter signs an e-transcript, the realLegal.com signature server then combines the reporters' identification information, the unique transcript fingerprint, recipient name, transcript title, transcript tracking number, date and time into a secure electronic bundle. This bundle is stored in the realLegal.com signature database, returned as an electronic transcript signature certificate and attached to the e-transcript.

Signatures are then presented to the user in the secure, encrypted and password-protected e-transcript Viewer. This makes it impossible for a transcript to be altered. Transcripts never leave the court reporters' computer during signing, thereby further ensuring security.

realLegal.com Electronic Transcript Signatures uses Surety.com's patented digital notary technology to ensure transcript fidelity by detecting if the e-transcript has been tampered with either after it has been signed or in transit. It provides evidence that the specific transcript content was signed at a specific date and time by a specific person(s) for a specific recipient(s), thereby ensuring the authenticity of the court reporter and the transcript.

"The creation of a secure, Internet-based signature service will open new doors for the court reporting community," said Lisa Nagy Baker, former NCRA board member and President of Nagy Baker Courting Reporting firm in Youngstown, Ohio. "This landmark service will not only provide a labor and cost savings to court reporters, but it adds value and professionalism to the suite of services that this community offers to attorneys, courts and others."

Created with security in mind

realLegal.com takes into account statutory requirements and follows the rules established by the National Digital Transcript Certification Authority (NDTCA). The NDTCA sets standards for signing electronic transcripts. While establishing these standards, the NDTCA is working closely with the National Court Reporters Association (NCRA) and other industry standards organizations to identify the requirements of the legal industry.

The NDTCA requires that realLegal.com verifies the identity of the signer before a transcript is electronically signed. In order to meet this standard, realLegal.com employs a thorough process for enrolling users in our electronic transcript signature service. The methodology for enrolling users is critical to the process of creating legally admissible signatures.

To ensure the integrity and authenticity of e-transcripts signed using realLegal.com Electronic Transcript Signatures, realLegal.com has licensed the industry's only irrefutable electronic notary service from Surety.com, the leading provider of digital notarization services. Founded by security experts, Surety.com provides independent time-stamping services to Fortune 500 companies in the financial, pharmaceutical, electronic document exchange and manufacturing industries.

About realLegal.com

Denver-based realLegal.com (formerly PubNETics), a law.com company, offers technology solutions for the legal arena, including courts, litigators and the $5.5 billion court reporting industry. As the creator and definitive expert in digital transcripts, realLegal.com offers a host of transcript-related products and services based on its industry standard product, e-transcript(TM).

These include e-brief(TM), hyperlinked briefs on CD-ROM for attorneys' submission and courts' review of a case; e-transcript binder(TM), for management of multiple e-transcripts; e-transcript view binder(TM), allowing court reporters to provide their clients with complete e-transcript and exhibit review on CD-ROM; and Electronic Transcript Signatures.

In addition to its desktop services, realLegal.com has also established itself as a leading ASP for the legal industry, offering e-transcript Internet(TM) for the online creation of e-transcripts; Court Transcript Management Systems for centralized, e-commerce-enabled court transcript systems; and the creation of unique Web sites for the dissemination of trial e-transcripts to the media and the public.