Title: In Re: Amendments To The Rules Regulating The Florida Bar – Rule 4-7.6, Computer Accessed Communications

State: florida

Issuer: Florida Supreme Court

Document:

Supreme Court of Florida 
 
 
______________ 
 
No. SC08-1181 
______________ 
 
 
 
IN RE: AMENDMENTS TO THE RULES REGULATING THE FLORIDA 
BAR–– RULE 4-7.6, COMPUTER ACCESSED COMMUNICATIONS. 
 
[February 27, 2009] 
 
PER CURIAM. 
The Florida Bar petitions the Court to consider proposed amendments to 
Rule Regulating the Florida Bar 4-7.6 (Computer-accessed Communications).  We 
have jurisdiction.  See art. V, § 15, Fla. Const. 
Rule 4-7.6 regulates computer-accessed attorney advertising such as 
websites, electronic mail, and other forms of computer-accessed communications.  
The Bar proposes amendments to subdivisions 4-7.6(a) (Definition); 4-7.6(b) 
(Internet Presence); 4-7.6(c) (Electronic Mail Communications); and 4-7.6(d) 
(Advertisements).  The proposed amendments address changes in terminology and 
technology, take into account the methods the public uses to access computer 
advertising, recognize the vast flow of information through the Internet, and seek 
to provide a new approach to regulating computer-accessed attorney 
advertisements.  The proposals are the result of dedicated study and vital debate by 
The Florida Bar’s Special Committee on Website Advertising Rules (Special 
Committee), the Advertising Task Force 2004 (Task Force), the Board of 
Governors’ Rules Committee, and the Board of Governors.  The Court wishes to 
express its gratitude to The Florida Bar and its members who contributed to the 
development of these proposals.  
On January 15, 2008, the proposals were published for comment in The 
Florida Bar News.  In the notice, the Bar directed interested parties to file their 
comments directly with the Court.  Thereafter, on February 26, 2008, the Bar filed 
the proposed amendments with the Court.  The Court received only one comment.  
After considering the proposals and the comment, and holding oral argument on 
January 6, 2009, the Court declines to adopt the proposed amendments.   
The history of regulating computer-accessed lawyer advertising is a study in 
contrasts.1  This is most likely due to the nature of website advertising.  As noted 
in the Bar’s petition,  
                                          
 
1.  Before submitting previous proposed amendments to the Court for 
consideration, see In re Amendments to the Rules Regulating the Florida Bar - 
Advertising, 971 So. 2d 763 (Fla. 2007), the Task Force originally concluded that 
websites are distinguished from general advertising because the typical viewer 
would not access a lawyer’s website by accident, but would be searching for that 
lawyer, a lawyer with similar characteristics, or information regarding a specific 
legal topic.  In contrast, the Board of Governors’ Citizens Forum disagreed with 
the Task Force and concluded that attorney websites should be subject to the same 
general regulations as other forms of lawyer advertising.  The Citizen’s Forum 
 
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A website cannot be easily categorized as either information at the 
request of the prospective client, which is subject to no regulation 
under this subchapter but is subject to the general prohibition against 
dishonesty, or as advertising in a medium that is totally unsolicited 
and broadly disseminated to the public, such as television, radio, or 
print media.  Although some steps must be initiated by the viewer to 
access a website, the viewer might not necessarily be attempting to 
access that law firm’s website, or a law firm website at all.  It is 
therefore inappropriate to treat a website as information upon request, 
because it is not the same as direct contact with a known law firm 
requesting information.  On the other hand, the viewer is unlikely to 
access a lawyer or law firm website completely by accident.   
 
Further, the purpose of rule 4-7.6 is to protect consumers from misleading 
information, provide consumers with accurate and helpful information in the 
selection of a lawyer, and respect lawyers’ abilities to provide information about 
themselves to the public.  Thus, in the current proposals, the Bar sought to offer an 
intermediate position to regulate attorney websites.  The Bar urged a position 
between full application of all lawyer advertising rules and no regulation of 
websites under the lawyer advertising rules.  In short, the proposals would have 
                                                                                                                                        
reasoned that for website advertising, the public should be provided with the same 
protections (from false and misleading attorney advertising) that are required for 
more traditional methods of advertising.  Thereafter, the Board voted to continue 
regulating websites pursuant to the general advertising regulations, except for a 
few specified exceptions.   
Afterwards, through its study, the Special Committee determined that each 
substantive attorney advertising regulation should apply to attorney websites, and 
that websites should be subject to the same regulation as other forms of media, 
except websites should be exempt from the requirement that advertisements must 
be filed with the Bar for review.  However, in December 2006, the Board voted 
against adopting the Special Committee’s recommendation that all substantive 
lawyer advertising rules apply to lawyer websites. 
 
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required that the homepage of a website comply with all the substantive lawyer 
advertising regulations, which are set forth in rule 4-7.2.  After the homepage, the 
remainder of the website would not have been viewed as advertising, but would 
have been treated as information “upon request” of a prospective client.  See R. 
Regulating Fla. Bar 4-7.1(f) (Communications at a Prospective Client’s Request).  
The Bar believes that this approach would permit lawyers to provide information, 
behind the homepage, about the following, which are otherwise prohibited under 
the lawyer advertising rules:  (1) statements that characterize the quality of legal 
services being offered; (2) information regarding past results; and (3) testimonials.2   
 
In contrast to the Bar’s arguments, we find that the proposed amendments 
are not sufficient to make material behind the homepage fall under the concept of 
information “upon request” (which is exempted from regulation by subchapter 4-7, 
pursuant to rule 4-7.1(f)).  We recognize, however, that sufficient changes could be 
made to the rules regulating websites to make pages behind the homepage 
constitute material “upon request.”  For example, a website could require users to 
complete two steps on webpages before they could access result or testimonial 
information.  First, a user could be required to complete a “Request” page with 
their name, address, and phone number (all required fields).  Second, a disclaimer 
                                          
 
 
2.  The concurring and dissenting opinions discuss concerns regarding the 
use of testimonials that the majority agrees should be further considered by The 
Florida Bar.  Accordingly, we are referring, by separate letter, a request to The 
Florida Bar that it study and define the term “testimonial.” 
 
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page could appear with the bottom of the page requiring a click on a button to 
indicate that the user had read the disclaimer (and an option for the user to 
discontinue the request for information).  Only after the user navigated through 
these two pages would the user be able to obtain the additional information.  This 
process would make obtaining information from a website similar to obtaining 
information “upon request” from a lawyer, when a potential client picks up a 
phone and calls a lawyer to ask for information, and then is mailed a DVD or 
brochure by the lawyer with the requested information.   
Next, the Bar stated that there are significant difficulties in regulating 
attorney websites.  This includes the fact that websites are not static; posted 
material can be constantly and easily changed.  By comparison, a lawyer’s printed 
and televised advertisements cannot be changed on an hourly or daily basis.  In 
addition, printed, televised, and radio advertisements are usually short in duration, 
and convey a limited quantity of information to consumers.  Conversely, websites 
can present voluminous amounts of information, making the Bar’s review of that 
information an overwhelming task.  Thus, as the Bar is unable to review all of the 
material posted on attorney websites, we suggest that the Bar consider requiring 
attorneys to certify their compliance with the computer-accessed communications 
rules.  This required certification could be included on Bar members’ annual dues 
statements, similar to the required certification of compliance with the trust 
 
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accounting rules.  See R. Regulating Fla. Bar 5-1.2(c)(5) (lawyers shall annually 
file with the Bar a trust accounting certificate showing compliance with the trust 
accounting rules).  If the Bar’s general investigations of websites reveal an attorney 
whose website does not comply with the advertising rules, the Bar could then 
proceed with a disciplinary investigation of the attorney, in a manner similar to 
when the Bar discovers violations of the trust accounting rules.  See R. Regulating 
Fla. Bar 5-1.2(e)(1) (when an attorney fails to file the trust account certificate 
required by rule 5-1.2(c)(5), the Bar shall order an audit of the trust account), 5-
1.2(e)(7) (when requested by a grievance committee or the Board of Governors, 
the Bar shall order an audit of a trust account).  
Finally, the proposed amendments would have deleted the requirement in 
current subdivision 4-7.6(b)(1) that a website disclose all jurisdictions where the 
lawyer is licensed to practice.  The Bar asserts that the existing language in rule 4-
7.6(b)(1) is redundant, arguing that the disclosure of jurisdictions in which a 
lawyer is licensed to practice is also required in current rule 4-7.2(b)(1)(B) (lawyer 
advertising may include date of admission to Florida Bar and other bars, and a 
listing of other jurisdictions where the lawyer is licensed to practice).  However, 
the plain language of rule 4-7.2(b)(1)(B) (“may”) does not require that the website 
provide this information.  Therefore, the existing requirement in rule 4-7.6 is 
necessary to protect members of the public who might find an attorney through 
 
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computer-accessed advertising, and the requirement does not unduly burden the 
advertising attorney.  Because a person can be located almost anywhere in the 
world when she finds the webpage of an advertising attorney, the rules should 
continue to require the attorney’s homepage to clearly state the jurisdictions in 
which the attorney is licensed to practice.   
Accordingly, the Court declines to adopt the proposed amendments to Rule 
Regulating the Florida Bar 4-7.6.  
It is so ordered. 
WELLS, PARIENTE, LEWIS, POLSTON, and LABARGA, JJ., concur. 
PARIENTE, J., concurs with an opinion, in which LABARGA, J., concurs. 
CANADY, J., concurs in result only with an opinion. 
QUINCE, C.J., concurs in part and dissents in part with an opinion. 
 
NOT FINAL UNTIL TIME EXPIRES TO FILE REHEARING MOTION, AND 
IF FILED, DETERMINED. 
 
 
PARIENTE, J., concurring. 
To say the least, the question of how this Court, through The Florida Bar, 
should address the relatively new technology of websites, electronic mail, and 
other forms of computer-accessed communications has been a difficult and 
complex one to resolve.  As always, the Court, through its advertising regulations, 
endeavors to protect the public from false and misleading advertising and protect 
the justice system and profession from denigration by improper advertising. 
 
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However, we must also recognize that these two strong interests must be balanced 
against the First Amendment protections given to commercial speech.   
 In my view, lawyer advertising has changed the face of the legal profession 
and that change has not been a positive one.  To determine what extent lawyer 
advertising was adversely affecting the administration of justice, research 
commissioned by The Florida Bar Task Force on Lawyer Advertising in 1999 
found: 
[L]awyer advertising simply does not provide the public with the 
useful, factual information that it wants and needs in order to make an 
informed choice about the hiring of a lawyer.  Significantly, the data 
further shows that much lawyer advertising—especially television 
advertising—lowers the public’s respect for the fairness and integrity 
of the legal system.   
Amendments to Rules Regulating the Florida Bar—Advertising Rules, 762 So. 2d 
392, 406 (Pariente, J. concurring in part and dissenting in part) (quoting The 
Florida Bar Advertising Task Force report).  In addition, a survey conducted at that 
time “revealed that 88% of the judges believe that lawyer advertising has adversely 
affected the public’s confidence in the administration of justice, and virtually all of 
those judges (95%) believe that the effect of lawyer advertising was a negative 
one.”  Id. n.8. 
Despite our best efforts to regulate lawyer advertising, we have lawyers’ 
advertisements on the sides of buses, the tops of taxis, and the backs of benches.  
We see advertisements on television and hear advertising on the radio.  The yellow 
 
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pages are filled with lawyer advertising as well.  The internet presents new and 
different challenges from those presented by other forms of lawyer advertising.  In 
some ways, the prevalence of attorney websites is less offensive to me than 
advertising on television, radio, billboards, buses, taxis, and benches.  The careful 
use of a website allows for the opportunity to convey complete and meaningful 
information unlike the shorthand versions seen in the other media. 
 The majority opinion explains the history of regulating internet-based 
communications, recognizing the “vast flow of information through the Internet.”  
As the majority recognizes, the approach to regulation of internet-based 
communications has been a “study in contrasts.”  At one side of the spectrum is the 
view that all aspects of attorney websites should be subject to the same general 
regulations as other forms of lawyer advertising; on the other side is the view that 
all attorney websites should be exempt from lawyer advertising rules, essentially 
treating attorney websites as information provided to prospective clients upon 
request.  See R. Regulating Fla. Bar 4-7.1(f) (Communications at a Prospective 
Client’s Request). 
The proposed rule before the Court represents the Bar’s attempt to strike a 
middle ground, by making all material behind the attorney website homepage fall 
under the category of “information upon request,” which is exempted from 
regulation.  The Court, through its rejection of the Florida Bar’s proposed rule, 
 
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does not believe that the rule provides sufficient protection for the public and 
suggests ways in which a rule could be fashioned to more fully vindicate the 
necessity for regulation of attorney advertising.  Instead, the Court has set forth 
alternatives that could be acceptable, beginning with requiring that any individual 
accessing material beyond the homepage must complete at least two steps (or two 
clicks of the mouse) until information appears that would be deemed the equivalent 
of “information upon request.”     
After the “two clicks,” the consumer or prospective client would then be 
able to access information otherwise prohibited by the lawyer advertising rules: (1) 
statements that characterize the quality of the legal services being offered; (2) 
information regarding past results; and (3) testimonials.  I agree that this is a 
reasonable compromise and one that makes sense, but I do express my concern that 
the issue of “testimonials” requires further definition. 
Presently The Florida Bar rules do not define the term “testimonial” and the 
Court is requesting that The Florida Bar further study and define what is meant by 
the term “testimonial” and report back to the Court.  Like Chief Justice Quince, I 
find it is these laudatory-type statements or “testimonials” that are the most 
troubling because they have the most potential for abuse and the most potential for 
further denigrating the justice system and this profession in the minds of the 
public.  
 
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Finally, it is always important to remember that all lawyer communications 
remain subject to the general prohibition against conduct involving dishonesty, 
deceit, or misrepresentation.  Therefore, if the information contained on the 
website is false or deceitful, that attorney will be subject to sanctions for such 
misconduct.  
LABARGA, J., concurs. 
 
 
CANADY, J., concurring in result only. 
 
Although I am sympathetic to the goal of adopting clear rules with respect to 
the information concerning legal service which may be provided in attorney-
sponsored websites, I believe that the subject requires further study.  I therefore 
agree that we should currently decline to adopt the rule amendments proposed by 
the Bar. 
 
A central part of the Bar’s proposal is to adopt provisions allowing on 
webpages other than a homepage three types of information: testimonials, 
statements about the quality of a lawyer’s services, and statements concerning past 
results.  This element of the proposal is premised on the understanding that 
information in these categories may currently be made available upon the request 
of a prospective client.  I see no reason to question this understanding with respect 
to the category of statements about the quality of a lawyer’s services.  The other 
 
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two categories—testimonials and statements regarding past results—are a different 
matter. 
 
Rule 4-7.1(f) provides a general exemption from the application of 
subchapter 4-7—which regulates lawyer advertising—for “communications 
between a lawyer and a prospective client if made at the request of that prospective 
client.”  Rule 4-7.6(b)(3) currently provides that “[a]ll World Wide Web and home 
pages accessed via the Internet that are controlled or sponsored by a lawyer or law 
firm and that contain information concerning the lawyer’s or law firm’s services . . 
. are considered to be information provided upon request.”  Such communications 
nonetheless remain subject to “[t]he general rule prohibiting a lawyer from 
engaging in conduct involving dishonesty, deceit, or misrepresentation.”  Rule 4-
7.1(g).  The “general rule” to which reference is made is no doubt rule 4-8.4(c), 
which provides in pertinent part that “[a] lawyer shall not . . . engage in conduct 
involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit, or misrepresentation.” 
 
Rule 4-7.2(c)(1), which prohibits any “false, misleading, or deceptive 
communication [by a lawyer] about the lawyer or the lawyer’s services,” provides 
that a communication violates the rule when, among other things, the 
communication “contains any reference to past successes or results obtained,” rule 
4-7.2(c)(1)(F), or “contains a testimonial,” rule 4-7.2(c)(1)(J).  The comment to 
rule 4-7.2(c)(1)(J) states that the rule “precludes endorsement or testimonials, 
 
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whether from clients or anyone else, because they are inherently misleading to a 
person untrained in the law.”  (Emphasis added.)  The provisions of rule 4-
7.2(c)(1) suggest that testimonials and statements regarding results obtained may 
by their very nature run afoul of the general prohibition in rule 4-8.4(c) of 
“dishonesty, fraud, deceit, or misrepresentation,” and thus would not be 
permissible even as information provided at the request of a prospective client. 
This is a matter that should be considered and clarified before a proposal 
such as that presented by the Bar is adopted. 
 
 
QUINCE, C.J., concurring in part and dissenting in part. 
 
I concur in the majority’s decision to not adopt the proposed amendments.    
However, I disagree with that portion of the opinion that suggest that if a user has 
to navigate at least two pages that makes the rest  of the website “upon request”  
and therefore the rest of the website would not be subject to regulation by the Bar.   
In addition to the input of the Special Committee on Website Advertising, 
the Advertising Task Force, the Rules Committee and the Board of Governors, the 
Board of Governors’ Citizens Forum also looked at the proposed changes to the 
rule.  The citizens forum, composed of citizens who could be consumers of legal 
services, recommended that websites be subject to the same substantive rules as all 
other forms of lawyer advertisement including submission of the filing with the 
 
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Bar for review.  Even the Special Committee on Website Advertising 
recommended that the substantive lawyer advertising rules should apply to 
websites, excluding only the requirement of filing with the Bar for review.   I agree 
with these groups that the substantive advertising rules of the Bar should apply to 
web-based advertisements.  It seems incongruous to me that we are considering a 
loosening of the advertisement rules and the allowance of more self-lauding 
statements, i.e., past results and testimonials, in a forum that the Bar admits it 
cannot adequately review and which changes frequently.  I would therefore apply 
the advertising rules to websites. 
 
 
Original Proceeding – Rules Regulating the Florida Bar  
 
John F. Harkness, Jr., Executive Director, The Florida Bar, Tallahassee, Florida, 
John G. White, III, President, The Florida Bar, West Palm Beach, Florida, Jesse H. 
Diner, President-elect, Fort Lauderdale, Charles Chobee Ebbets, Chair, Special 
Committee on Website Advertising Rules, Daytona Beach, Florida, Elizabeth 
Clark Tarbert, Ethics Counsel, The Florida Bar, Tallahassee, Florida, and Mary 
Ellen Bateman, Director, Legal Division DEUP, The Florida Bar, Tallahassee, 
Florida,  
 
 
for Petitioner 
 
Timothy P. Chinaris, Montgomery, Alabama, 
 
 
Responding with comments