What happens to your case files if your computer fails: a backup checklist for solo attorneys
Most attorneys don't think about their backup situation until they need it, at which point it's too late to fix. A hard drive fails, a laptop gets stolen, or a spilled coffee takes out a machine mid-case, and the question becomes whether the last backup was current, or whether it exists at all.
This matters more for solo and small-firm litigators than it might for a larger firm, because there's usually no IT department quietly running backups in the background. If backup happens, it happens because the attorney or their assistant deliberately made it happen.
Here's a practical checklist for making sure a computer failure doesn't turn into a caseload emergency.
1. Know whether your case management software backs up automatically or requires action
Some case management software backs up as a byproduct of how it's built, because your case information already lives somewhere other than only your computer. Local-first software, which stores your case information primarily on your own computer, needs a deliberate backup step, since there isn't automatically a second copy elsewhere. Neither approach is wrong, but you need to know which one applies to whatever you're using. For more on this distinction, see Local-first vs. cloud legal software: where does your case data actually live.
2. Create backups on a schedule, not just when you remember
A backup made once, six months ago, isn't meaningfully different from no backup for a case that's had activity since then. Whatever backup process you use, whether it's built into your case management software or a separate step, it needs to happen on a recurring basis, not only when something reminds you to do it.
3. Store the backup somewhere other than the computer it's backing up
A backup stored on the same machine it's protecting doesn't help if that machine is the thing that fails. An external drive, a separate encrypted storage location, or a secondary device all solve this. The specific method matters less than making sure the backup and the original aren't both destroyed by the same event.
4. Know what "restore" actually looks like before you need it
It's worth testing a restore before an emergency forces you to do it for the first time under pressure. Confirm you know where backups are stored, what the restore process involves, and roughly how long it takes. Finding out during an actual computer failure that the restore process doesn't work the way you expected is the worst possible time to learn that.
5. If you use Pro-style collaboration, understand recovery separately from backup
If you work with an assistant or paralegal through a synchronized plan, recovery works a little differently than a simple local backup, because there's a protected copy involved. On Handled.'s Pro plan, case information can be recovered through the account's recovery process in addition to any local backup, but recovery information has to be kept safe ahead of time. Handled. cannot recreate lost recovery information after the fact, which is also true of most systems built so the vendor cannot read your case information by design. See the FAQ for the specifics of how recovery works on each plan.
6. Don't treat "cloud" as a synonym for "backed up"
If your case management software happens to be cloud-first, it's worth confirming whether that actually functions as a backup for you, or whether it's simply where the only copy of your data lives. A single copy stored in a vendor's cloud, with no separate backup and no local copy, carries its own version of the same risk this checklist is about: one point of failure.
Putting it together
The specific tools matter less than the habit: know where your case information lives, make sure a second copy exists somewhere else, and confirm periodically that the restore process actually works. That's true whether you're using Handled. or something else, and it's worth checking today rather than after a failure forces the question. For more on how Handled. is built around this from the start, including working entirely offline between backups, see the security section of the homepage or the Case management software for solo litigators: what to actually look for checklist.