TSL.P EP# 132 (Special Episode): AI, Deepfakes, and Metadata: Guest-Hosting Capital University Law School’s First Law Library Podcast Club with Professor Jennifer Wondracek 🎙️⚖️

/ The Tech-Savvy Lawyer.Page/

🎙️ This week we have something special for you. Your The Tech-Savvy Lawyer.Page blogger and podcaster, Michael D.J. Eisenberg, was invited back to his alma mater, Capital University Law School, to guest host their very first Podcast Club — a live, recorded podcast conversation featuring real law students, real questions, and real talk. Moderated alongside Professor Wondracek, this is an unscripted, in-the-moment discussion — not a produced studio episode, not a rehearsed explainer — just an honest, practitioner-led conversation about the issues shaping the legal profession today. 🎓 We think that's exactly what makes it worth your time.

In this bonus episode, Professor Wondracek and I sit down with a group of Capital Law students for a wide-ranging conversation on the ethical and practical challenges facing every legal professional in the age of generative AI. 🤖 The students don't hold back — their questions are sharp, current, and reflective of exactly what tomorrow's practitioners are grappling with right now. From deepfakes submitted as courtroom evidence, to AI tools that can silently waive attorney-client privilege, to file metadata that can make or break a case — this conversation covers the ground that matters, in plain language, without talking down to anyone. Whether you are just starting out in the law, deep into practice, or simply someone who wants to understand how AI is reshaping professional responsibility, pull up a chair. 🛡️⚖️

In our conversation, we cover the following:

  • [00:00] 🎬 Welcome & Introductions — Professor Wondracek introduces Michael D.J. Eisenberg; Michael shares his background representing veterans before the VA and his work at The Tech-Savvy Lawyer.Page, including his Amazon #1 bestselling book The Lawyer's Guide to Podcasting

  • [01:00] 🕵️ What Is a Deepfake? — Defining deepfakes and the real-world Bethesda incident where a fabricated video triggered a police raid and wasted critical law enforcement resources

  • [02:30] ⚖️ Deepfakes in Legal Practice — The serious professional responsibility consequences when attorneys introduce fake or AI-generated evidence into a trial or negotiation — and why "I didn't know" won't always protect you

  • [03:00] 📋 ABA Model Rule 1.1 — Competence & Comment 8 — Why technology competence is an ethical obligation, not optional — and what "competent use of technology" actually means for your daily practice

  • [05:00] 📶 Public Wi-Fi & VPN Security — The real dangers of using public Wi-Fi at airports, coffee shops, and on planes without a VPN, especially when accessing client portals, trust accounts, or confidential client communications

  • [05:45] 🔐 VPN Recommendations — NordVPN vs. ExpressVPN; why the right VPN matters for protecting your clients and your license

  • [07:00] 🔍 How to Detect Deepfakes in Evidence — Reviewing file metadata, spotting visual anomalies, and the Mendones v. Cushman & Wakefield case (Cal. Super. Ct. 2025) where Judge Victoria Kolakowski spotted deepfake videos — and imposed terminating sanctions

  • [08:30] 📜 ABA Model Rule 3.3 — Candor to the Tribunal — Your duty of honesty to the court and the compounding risks of unknowingly submitting falsified AI-generated evidence

  • [09:30] 🧑‍⚖️ ABA Model Rule 8.4 — Dishonesty, Fraud, Deceit & Misrepresentation — How these rules can stack with Rule 3.3 to multiply your ethical exposure

  • [10:30] 🖼️ Live Demo: Accessing File Metadata — A real-time screen share showing how to right-click and access image properties, including GPS coordinates, camera settings, file timestamps, and modification history — using a photo taken right at Capital University Law School

  • [14:00] 🗂️ Metadata Scrubbing — Why some law firms strip metadata from outgoing emails and documents, and why "scrubbed" evidence should raise red flags during discovery

  • [17:30] 🛡️ Five Basic Safeguards for Legal Professionals in the AI Era:

    1. Invest in ongoing education — CLEs, podcasts, blogs

    2. Know and follow your office's technology protocols

    3. Be transparent with clients about your use of AI — in your engagement letters and contracts

    4. Update your engagement letters and retainer agreements now

    5. Stay alert to the rapidly changing AI landscape — ignoring it is not an option

  • [20:00] 💬 Student Q&A — George's question: Does the ethical obligation to review metadata create a resource gap between large firms and solo practitioners? What AI tools can help level the playing field?

  • [22:00] ⚠️ United States v. Heppner (S.D.N.Y. 2026) — The landmark federal ruling that AI-generated documents used with consumer AI tools are NOT protected by attorney-client privilege or work product doctrine — and why your choice of AI platform is now an ethics decision

  • [23:30] 🔒 Consumer AI vs. Secure Legal AI Platforms — The critical difference between free and low-cost consumer AI accounts and enterprise-grade legal AI tools with zero-data-retention contracts

  • [25:30] 📚 LexisNexis Protégé & Secure AI — How LexisNexis's zero-retention, end-to-end encrypted AI platform — including access to ChatGPT and Claude — lets attorneys use AI ethically without jeopardizing client data

  • [27:00] 💾 Prompt Discoverability — Why your AI prompts may be subpoenaed in malpractice claims or bar investigations, and why documenting and downloading your AI usage history matters

  • [28:30] 📁 Cassia's Question — Documenting AI research and adopting a random sampling strategy for metadata review: practical approaches to demonstrating "reasonable" due diligence

  • [30:00] 🗃️ eDiscovery Tools for Metadata at Scale — Relativity, Disco, and how these platforms help even resource-limited firms surface metadata anomalies across large document sets

  • [33:00] 📰 Current Awareness Resources — Where to stay current on legal tech: law.com, bar association newsletters, The Tech-Savvy Lawyer.Page blog and podcast, CLEs, and legal listservs

  • [33:30] 🚨 Hallucinated AI Citations & Real Consequences — Mata v. Avianca, Wadsworth v. Walmart (Morgan & Morgan pro hac vice revoked), the Chicago firm dissolution case — and why citation-checking is now a non-negotiable litigation skill

  • [37:00] 🎲 Book Giveaway — Rolling the virtual dice; congratulations to the winner of Michael's book, The Lawyer's Guide to Podcasting!

  • [38:00] 🗓️ Upcoming Events — Michael joins the Capital Law Spring Summit/Bootcamp in April; dinner with students at The Red Door Tavern

Resources

Connect with Professor Jennifer Wondracek:

  • E-Mail: jwondracek@law.capital.edu 

  • LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jennifer-wondracek

📌 Mentioned in the Episode

🏛️ ABA Model Rules

⚖️ Case Law

💻 Hardware Mentioned in the Conversation

🤔 Other

☁️ Software & Cloud Services Mentioned in the Conversation