Our last article on zombie tech resonated with in-house legal teams and is among our highest-read articles. It shed light on the hidden dangers of outdated software lurking within businesses and the legal risks associated with it.
Over a year since this article was published, zombie tech remains a critical issue. Organisations face challenges posed by unsupported, unused, and forgotten systems, which continue to be a persistent risk to security, compliance, and efficiency.
As a follow-up, this latest article revisits the concept of zombie tech, offering fresh insights and practical strategies tailored to the evolving landscape of 2025.
What is Zombie Tech?
Zombie tech refers to software that has fallen out of use or technical support but still exists within a company’s operations. This includes legacy CRMs, outdated accounting platforms, or old tools incompatible with modern systems that haven’t been adequately upgraded or decommissioned.
The risks associated with zombie tech are as present as ever, but the stakes are higher now. As organisations navigate increasingly sophisticated cyber threats and stricter regulatory requirements, addressing zombie tech is no longer optional—it’s essential.
Why Zombie Tech is Still a Problem
The risks posed by zombie tech are multifaceted:
- Security vulnerabilities: Unsupported systems lack critical updates, making them prime cyberattack targets.
- Compliance risks: Using outdated software can lead to breaches of regulations like GDPR or other data privacy laws, which can result in heavy fines.
- Operational inefficiency: Zombie tech drains resources, with costs wasted on maintaining systems and manual workarounds that no longer deliver value.
- Data management concerns: Legacy systems often retain personal data that is no longer needed, increasing legal and privacy risks.
How to Identify and Eliminate Zombie Tech
Building on the strategies from 2023, here’s how organisations can tackle zombie tech in today’s environment:
- Technology audits focusing on privacy: Regularly review your tech stack to identify unsupported or unused software. Privacy and data protection checks should be included to ensure compliance with retention and security standards.
- Security and certification reviews: Verify that your software remains secure and compliant. Check for GDPR alignment and updated certifications like ISO 27001, and use tools like Security Scorecard to monitor the vendor’s performance and vulnerabilities.
- Team education: Raise awareness among staff about the risks of zombie tech. Informed employees are likelier to spot and report outdated systems before becoming liabilities.
- Isolation of legacy systems: Where immediate retirement isn’t possible, isolate legacy systems from your core network. Specialist support can help maintain functionality while reducing risk.
- Decommissioning done right: When retiring software, prioritise secure removal of sensitive data and ensure no connections remain to active systems. This prevents lingering vulnerabilities.
- Data migration: Data migration is time consuming, complex and expensive, and isn’t always necessary. Consider the bare minimum of data required for records keeping and historic analysis.
- Future-proofing through strategic planning: Stay ahead of tech trends to anticipate when software will need replacing. Build upgrade cycles into your technology strategy to minimise future reliance on zombie tech.
Why Legal Teams Should Engage
Zombie tech isn’t just a technology issue—it’s also legal and compliance issue. Legal and compliance teams are pivotal in identifying and mitigating risks, from data breaches to non-compliance.
By collaborating with IT and operational leaders, they can:
- Flag risks uncovered during audits.
- Push for timely action on compliance gaps.
- Ensure robust oversight of privacy and retention obligations.
Conclusion
Zombie tech may be lurking, but it’s not inevitable. With vigilance, education, and proactive measures, organisations can exorcise outdated systems, safeguarding operations against inefficiency, security risks, and regulatory pitfalls. Staying ahead of the curve ensures a tech stack that’s secure, compliant, and future-ready.
Lawcadia is a legal technology company with a cloud-based platform that in-house legal teams and their law firms use to manage intake, matters, engagements, RFPs, and spend. It enables users to be more efficient, control processes and spend, and have visibility across the legal function.
An award-winning, easy to implement, intuitive and affordable end-to-end legal operations platform, Lawcadia incorporates no-code workflow automation and logic-based processes with a collaborative and secure interface.
Clients include corporate and government legal teams and over 150 law firms.
Founded in 2015, Lawcadia is headquartered in Brisbane, Australia with clients in Asia-Pacific, UK and the US.
