Attorney-Client Privilege

Last Updated: May 27, 2026

Roadmap Law PLLC delivers legal services through a technology-enabled platform. Every system in that platform is designed to preserve attorney-client privilege from the moment you first communicate with us through the conclusion of your matter.

This page explains how we maintain that privilege across each component of our infrastructure — and why it attaches earlier than you might expect.

Roadmap does not use Client Content to train, fine‑tune, or otherwise modify any AI model — whether operated by Roadmap, by Perplexity, or by any third‑party model provider — unless Client has expressly authorized that specific training activity in a signed writing referencing this commitment. This commitment is reinforced in our Privacy Policy §8, Terms of Service §3.4, and Security §6.

When Privilege Attaches

Under a Counsel subscription, attorney‑client privilege only forms when actual work starts with an attorney — and any later additional work. Holding an active Counsel subscription does not, by itself, create an attorney‑client relationship across every topic you might raise. The relationship forms matter‑by‑matter: when Roadmap Law PLLC commences specific legal work for you, after automated conflict and jurisdictional checks have cleared and an attorney has been assigned to that matter. Each additional piece of work opened under the same subscription forms its own attorney‑client relationship in the same way.

Until that point, your communications with us at intake are protected as prospective‑client confidentiality under New York and ABA Model Rule 1.18 (see next section), but they are not yet covered by the full attorney‑client privilege or the work‑product doctrine.

Once the relationship is formed for a given matter, the privilege protects the documents and facts you submit, the analysis and work product we prepare, and all communications between you and your assigned attorney on that matter. Privilege does not depend on whether a separate charge has been collected for the matter — it depends on whether the engagement has been formed.

Confidentiality protections begin earlier than privilege does. The rule in the next section explains how.

Pre-Engagement Communications Are Protected

Under ABA Model Rule 1.18 and the analogous New York Rule of Professional Conduct 1.18, a person who consults with a lawyer for the purpose of obtaining legal representation — a “prospective client” — is owed duties of confidentiality even if no engagement is ultimately formed. Communications made in good faith for the purpose of seeking legal advice are confidential, even before any matter has been formally opened.

At Roadmap Law, this means: what you tell us in your private Slack channel while seeking legal help is confidential from the moment you say it — not from the moment Ava completes conflict and jurisdictional checks or an attorney is formally assigned. You do not need to hold back at intake. The full attorney‑client privilege and the work‑product doctrine attach once the engagement is formed (see “When Privilege Attaches”); intake communications before that point are protected by the prospective‑client duty of confidentiality under Rule 1.18.

This prospective-client protection is limited to communications inside your private Slack channel made for the purpose of obtaining legal advice. It does not extend to information shared publicly, with third parties, or outside that channel.

Be direct with us from the start. The protection is already in place.

How Each System Preserves Privilege

Slack Connect (Communication Layer)

Your Slack Connect channel is a private, dedicated channel between your organization and Roadmap Law PLLC. It functions as a secure communication channel for privileged legal communications.

Only your authorized team members, your assigned Roadmap attorney, and Roadmap's AI assistant (operating under attorney direction and supervision) have access to the channel.
Slack Connect channels are isolated by design — no other client or third party can access your channel.
Slack maintains SOC 2 Type II and ISO 27001 certifications. Messages are encrypted in transit via TLS.
Slack is engaged as a service provider under terms that prohibit access to or use of message content for any purpose other than delivering the communication service.

The channel is the functional equivalent of a privileged conference room. The medium is digital, but the privilege is the same.

Perplexity Sonar API (AI Analysis Layer)

When your documents are processed by AI for first-pass analysis, the AI operates as a tool under attorney supervision — analogous to a research assistant working at the direction of your attorney.

Zero data retention: Perplexity's Sonar API does not store, log, or retain any document content after processing. Your contract is processed in memory and immediately discarded. See Perplexity's API Privacy & Security documentation.
No training on your data: Your documents are never used to train, fine-tune, or improve AI models. There is no commingling of your data with any other client's data or any public dataset.
No human access at Perplexity: Perplexity employees do not review API request content. The only data retained is billing metadata (token count, model, timestamp, API key identifier) — none of which contains privileged information.
Attorney supervision: The AI output is generated at the direction of and reviewed by a licensed New York attorney before any work product is delivered to you. The attorney exercises independent professional judgment over every deliverable.

Under New York ethics guidance, the use of AI tools does not waive attorney-client privilege provided the attorney maintains competence and supervision over the tool's output, the tool's data handling does not result in disclosure to third parties, and the client is informed of the tool's use. We satisfy all three requirements.

Google Workspace (Document Editing Layer)

Attorneys conduct redlining and document markup in Google Docs. This is the functional equivalent of an attorney editing a contract with tracked changes.

Documents are stored in Google Drive folders scoped to the specific matter and accessible only to the assigned attorney and authorized Roadmap Law PLLC personnel.
Google Workspace maintains SOC 2 Type II, ISO 27001, and FedRAMP certifications. Documents are encrypted at rest (AES-256) and in transit (TLS).
Google's terms of service for Workspace accounts confirm that Google does not access customer content for advertising or any purpose unrelated to service delivery.
Redlined documents and attorney comments in Google Docs constitute attorney work product.

Notion (Matter Management Layer)

Attorneys use Notion as the internal matter‑management workspace — the system of record for matter status, attorney notes, deliverable drafts and summaries, and Client Content that the assigned attorney(s) actively reference while working a matter. Notion is the functional equivalent of a private attorney case file maintained on a secure, access‑controlled platform.

Matter pages and Client Content in Notion are accessible only to the attorney(s) assigned to that matter and authorized Roadmap Law PLLC personnel. Notion access is scoped via Roadmap’s Business plan workspace with SAML SSO via Google Workspace and full audit logging.
Notion maintains SOC 2 Type II and ISO 27001 certifications. Workspace content is encrypted at rest (AES‑256) and in transit (TLS 1.2+).
Notion is engaged as a sub‑processor under a data‑processing addendum that prohibits access to or use of customer content for any purpose other than delivering the workspace service. Notion does not train AI models on Roadmap workspace content.
Internal attorney notes, mental impressions, legal theories, and matter strategy stored in Notion constitute attorney work product.

Client Portal (Billing & Account)

The Roadmap client portal handles subscription management, billing, hour‑pack purchases, and other administrative actions. No privileged legal content — documents, legal analysis, attorney communications — passes through or is stored in the portal. The portal contains account information, subscription status, and payment records. These are administrative records, not privileged communications.

Stripe (Payment Processing)

Stripe processes payments only. No legal content is transmitted to or stored by Stripe. Transaction records (amount, date, description) are administrative and do not implicate privilege.

Single‑Firm Delivery; Legal vs. Advisory

All Roadmap services — legal and advisory — are delivered by Roadmap Law PLLC. There is no separate non‑law‑firm affiliate sitting between you and your attorney. Every engagement runs through the law firm, governed by the New York Rules of Professional Conduct.

Legal engagements (Roadmap Counsel, Roadmap Personal). The attorney‑client relationship attaches when the conditions in “When Privilege Attaches” are met. Privilege and the work‑product doctrine apply to all matter communications and deliverables across every channel listed above.

Advisory engagements (Roadmap Operator). Advisory work is delivered by Roadmap Law PLLC but is non‑legal in nature. No attorney‑client relationship is formed by an advisory engagement, and communications and work product associated with an advisory engagement are confidential under contract but are not protected by the attorney‑client privilege or the work‑product doctrine. The same firm, the same people, and the same platform‑level confidentiality and security controls apply — but legal privilege does not.

Concurrent subscriptions. Roadmap Counsel, Roadmap Personal, and Roadmap Operator are independent products and may be held in any combination. Information generated under a legal subscription is segregated from advisory‑only information through per‑engagement workspaces and role‑based access controls. The legal‑subscription character of communications and deliverables is preserved even when the same Client also holds Roadmap Operator. See the Terms of Service for the governing terms.

Sources of Confidentiality Protection

Counsel and Personal (legal engagements). Your information is protected primarily by the New York Rules of Professional Conduct. Under NY RPC 1.6, a New York‑licensed attorney has a professional duty of confidentiality to every client and prospective client — enforceable by the New York bar, with discipline up to and including disbarment for violations, and including the technology‑safeguard requirements of RPC 1.6(c). Once a matter is formed under our Terms of Service §6.1, the attorney‑client privilege and the work‑product doctrine additionally protect your communications and materials from being compelled into discovery. At intake, before a matter is formed, the prospective‑client duty under NY RPC 1.18 applies (see “Pre‑Engagement Communications Are Protected” above).

Operator (advisory engagement). Operator is not a legal engagement. No attorney‑client relationship is formed; the attorney‑client privilege and the work‑product doctrine do not apply. Confidentiality for Operator engagements is committed by contract — the confidentiality covenants in the Terms of Service §6.5. The Roadmap attorneys staffed on an Operator engagement remain personally bound by their applicable rules of professional conduct with respect to information they learn, but that is a personal duty owed by the lawyer; it is not an evidentiary privilege that protects your information from third‑party compelled disclosure.

Sub‑processors. Each sub‑processor used to deliver the Roadmap service — including Slack, Google Workspace, Notion, Stripe, Vercel, and Perplexity — is bound to Roadmap by service agreements and, where applicable, a data‑processing addendum imposing confidentiality and security obligations consistent with the practices described on this page. The complete, current list (with purposes, data categories, region, and key commitments) is maintained in the Privacy Policy §7; we treat that table as the single source of truth and update it when any sub‑processor changes.

Roadmap Law PLLC's engagement terms disclose the use of AI tools and third-party service providers in the delivery of legal services. By engaging our services, you acknowledge and consent to the use of these systems, subject to the safeguards described in this document.

AI processing — including Ava and the Perplexity Sonar API — is integral and native to the Roadmap service (Terms of Service §3.4). There is no AI‑free version of the engagement, and Roadmap does not offer an opt‑out from AI processing while a subscription remains active. A Client who can no longer accept AI processing may cancel the subscription under Terms of Service §5 and Module M‑SUB.5; cancellation does not give rise to a refund or proration of fees already paid (Module M‑SUB.6) and does not excuse any unpaid installments or the cumulative discount clawback under an Annual Commitment Plan (Modules M‑SUB.4 and M‑SUB.6). All AI output remains subject to licensed‑attorney review and independent professional judgment before delivery.

The Standard We Hold Ourselves To

New York Rule of Professional Conduct 1.6 requires that attorneys make reasonable efforts to prevent the inadvertent or unauthorized disclosure of confidential client information. Rule 1.6(c) specifically addresses the use of technology, requiring that the measures an attorney employs be reasonable under the circumstances.

We have selected each system in our stack based on its security posture, data handling practices, and compatibility with our privilege obligations. Specifically:

Every sub-processor maintains contractual obligations prohibiting access to or use of client data beyond service delivery.
No system in our workflow retains privileged content beyond what is necessary for the service it provides — and our AI provider retains nothing at all.
Access to privileged information is limited to the minimum personnel and systems necessary to deliver the legal service.
All AI output is reviewed by a licensed attorney who exercises independent judgment before delivery.

We treat the preservation of attorney-client privilege not as a checkbox but as an architectural requirement. Every technology decision is evaluated against this standard before deployment.

For more on how we protect your data across our platform, see our Security page and Privacy Policy.

Questions

If you have questions about how we preserve attorney-client privilege in your engagement, contact your assigned attorney directly or reach out to us at support@useroadmap.co.