The "Invisibility" Factor in Attorney Partnerships

Welcome to the show where we explore the hidden dynamics of professional relationships. Join Eddie Montes Travis and Marylyn Lee Trotter as they discuss how to build strong connections with law firms by mastering the invisibility factor in legal work. Knowing how to support a high-stakes environment without adding to the noise is a rare skill that attorneys value immensely. • Quiet Competence: Providing error-free service so the attorney never has to worry about the paperwork, making you an indispensable but silent partner. • Workflow Integration: Learning how to fit into a law firm's existing schedule without causing disruption or requiring extra oversight. • Professional Discretion: Handling sensitive legal documents with the level of privacy and confidentiality that attorneys expect from their closest associates. • Building Trust: Establishing a reputation where your presence is felt through results rather than constant self-promotion. Success in these partnerships often comes down to how well you can support the legal team from the background. By focusing on reliability and efficiency, you can secure long-term contracts and steady work. Please make sure to subscribe and like the podcast for more tips on growing your business.

Show Notes:
• Understanding the value of being a seamless part of a legal team
• How to build long-term trust with attorneys through reliability
• The importance of error-free work in high-stakes legal partnerships
• Tips for staying professional and discreet with sensitive documents

Buy Becoming a Notary on Amazon

Notary Knowledge Reference Guide and Notary Bible on Amazon

Your Sunday Notary Reading:
Notary Public Foundation: Essential Guide to Core Duties, Ethics, and Commissioning on Amazon

Your Monday Notary Reading:
Notary Operational Excellence: Mastering Certificates, Journals, Ink, and Copy Certification on Amazon

Your Tuesday Notary Reading:
Notary Fraud Shield: Real-World Tactics, Red Flags, and Refusal Strategies on Amazon

Your Wednesday Notary Reading:
The Mobile Notary Blueprint: Launching and Managing Your On-Demand Business on Amazon

Your Thursday Notary Reading:
Notary Niche Navigator: Your Guide to Loan Signings, Apostilles, I-9s, and More on Amazon

Your Friday Notary Reading:
Notary Law & Liability: Understanding State Regulations, Insurance, and Avoiding UPL

Your Saturday Notary Reading:
The Future Notary: Mastering RON, eNotary, and Complex Scenarios on Amazon

Quick & Easy Solutions How to Increase Mobile Notary Business for More Success & Profit: with 37 Professional Tips on Amazon

Executive Producer Derrick Spruill
Writers Marylyn Lee Trotter and Eddie Montes Travis
Graphics & Illustrations by Eddie Montes Travis
Music by Thomas Bynum
This Show is Produced by Magnificent Workz
Business Solutions

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:01

Are you looking for an edge, flexible income, and immediate professional respect? Discover the hidden opportunity of becoming a public official with the book, Becoming a Notary by Derek Spool. This beginner's guide provides the universal roadmap to launch your new career. You will learn the core mission of deterring fraud, the essential tools of the trade, and exactly how to protect yourself while building a respective business. Get your copy of Becoming a Notary on Amazon and step into a rewarding profession.

SPEAKER_01 0:37

Welcome to Notary Knowledge. I'm Marilyn.

SPEAKER_00 0:40

And I'm Eddie.

SPEAKER_01 0:40

And um, before we really jump into things today, we want to remind you to pick up the Notary Knowledge books by Derek Spool.

SPEAKER_00 0:47

Yeah, they are uh just fantastic resources for anyone in the field.

SPEAKER_01 0:52

Absolutely. And be sure to visit the Notary Knowledge website too. And you know, please rate the show, subscribe, share the podcast with others. It really, really helps us out.

SPEAKER_00 1:01

It definitely does.

SPEAKER_01 1:02

So, like we've talked about in prior episodes, we really like to look at the massive machinery behind the legal system. And today we're looking at the ultimate bottleneck of that system.

SPEAKER_00 1:12

Right. The bottleneck.

SPEAKER_01 1:13

Because imagine you have a multimillion dollar real estate deal, right? You've got like a skyscraper being sold in downtown Manhattan.

SPEAKER_00 1:21

Huge stakes.

SPEAKER_01 1:22

Yeah, exactly. Teams of high-powered attorneys, months of intense negotiations, just mountains of digital contracts, millions of dollars are queued up in international wire transfers. But um, all of that massive high-tech legal machinery can literally grind to a halt if someone doesn't possess a tiny inked rubber stamp.

SPEAKER_00 1:43

Aaron Powell It's true. I mean, it really is the ultimate bottleneck for the whole system. It's totally binary, stamped or not stamped.

SPEAKER_01 1:49

Right.

SPEAKER_00 1:50

Because without that specific mark of authenticity, uh the court won't accept the filing. The bank just won't release the funds. The entire transaction is frozen.

SPEAKER_01 2:00

Aaron Powell And when you look closely at how that stamp actually gets applied today, um the comforting old school image of, you know, a quiet clerk sitting behind a mahogany desk in a bank lobby is completely shattered.

SPEAKER_00 2:12

Oh, completely. It's a whole new world.

SPEAKER_01 2:14

Yeah. So today, pulling from National Notary Association bulletins, legal tech platforms like Clio and OneNotary and a bunch of workflow frameworks, we're exploring how notarization has transformed. It's become this highly mobile, fiercely digital, and honestly legally perilous industry.

SPEAKER_00 2:31

Yeah, it's it's the definition of a modern professional paradox. Yeah. This ancient analog concept, right? The impartial witness. And it's colliding head on with the fast-paced, highly secure demands of modern legal tech. And to understand why notaries are so crucial now, you really have to look at how they've um completely escaped the confines of the traditional office.

SPEAKER_01 2:54

Right, because nobody has the time to take an afternoon off work to hunt down a notary anymore.

SPEAKER_00 2:59

No, nobody.

SPEAKER_01 3:00

Which has fueled this explosive growth of mobile notaries and remote online notarization or Ron. Mobile notaries have essentially become like on-demand legal authenticators.

SPEAKER_00 3:12

Yeah, they're everywhere.

SPEAKER_01 3:13

They are traveling directly to hospital bedsides, to corporate boardrooms, uh local coffee shops. It's become such a lucrative field that paralegals are actually launching side gigs as mobile signing agents.

SPEAKER_00 3:25

Oh, yeah. A lot of them.

SPEAKER_01 3:26

They're making anywhere from like $100 to $200 an hour just by driving to a client's location after standard business hours.

SPEAKER_00 3:34

Which, you know, it makes perfect sense when you look at the economics of it. Well, think about it. If a law firm is closing a major real estate deal at 8.0 p.m. on a Friday, paying a mobile notary $200 to secure those final signatures is a uh it's a microscopic expense compared to delaying a multi-million dollar closing until Monday morning.

SPEAKER_01 3:57

Right. It's like they've become the last mile delivery service of the legal world.

SPEAKER_00 4:02

That is a great way to put it.

SPEAKER_01 4:03

Just like a logistics company ensuring a package arrives right at your physical doorstep, the mobile notary ensures the final, most crucial step of a legal transaction happens smoothly, exactly where you happen to be. Exactly. But I gotta ask, if we're doing this over a webcam or, you know, sitting at a really loud Starbucks with a mobile notary, I have to wonder about the security. Sure. Doesn't taking this out of a formal legal office introduce like a massive risk of fraud? It just feels incredibly casual for something so legally binding.

SPEAKER_00 4:31

Aaron Powell Well, that is the exact fear that regulators had. And it's actually the reason the technology behind remote online notarization has become so rigorous. It really isn't casual at all. Yeah, a Ron session isn't just a standard FaceTime or Zoom call. These platforms are highly regulated, closed environments. For starters, they have to be MISMO compliant.

SPEAKER_01 4:53

Okay, break that down for us. What does that alphabet soup actually mean in practice?

SPEAKER_00 4:57

Right. So MISMO is the mortgage industry standards maintenance organization. They basically set the digital standards for the entire real estate finance industry.

SPEAKER_01 5:06

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 5:06

But beyond that, these platforms have to adhere to really strict data security frameworks, um, like SOC2 type 2 and ISO 2701.

SPEAKER_01 5:17

Aaron Powell, which means what exactly?

SPEAKER_00 5:18

In plain English, SOC2 Type 2 isn't just a software feature. It is an ongoing third-party audit. It proves a company is continuously protecting client data.

SPEAKER_01 5:27

Oh, wow.

SPEAKER_00 5:28

Yeah. It ensures data is encrypted at rest and in transit, and it strictly tracks exactly who is accessing the servers and when.

SPEAKER_01 5:35

So you aren't just logging into a consumer app, you are logging into a digital vault.

SPEAKER_00 5:39

Exactly, a digital vault. And the identity verification process inside that vault is intense. First, they use knowledge-based authentication or KDA.

SPEAKER_01 5:48

Right, I've heard of that.

SPEAKER_00 5:49

Yeah. So this system pulls data from your deep credit history to ask you multiple choice questions in real time.

SPEAKER_01 5:56

Like those weirdly specific questions.

SPEAKER_00 5:58

Yes. It will ask things like, uh, which of these street addresses did you live at in 2014? Or what was the color of the Honda Civic you financed in 2018? And you have to answer correctly within a really strict time limit.

SPEAKER_01 6:12

I mean, that alone filters out most casual identity thieves, but what about the physical ID? Right. Like if someone holds up a fake driver's license to a webcam, how does the remote notary actually know it's real?

SPEAKER_00 6:23

That is where AI-powered credential analysis comes in. When you hold your ID up to the camera, the software isn't just, you know, snapping a photo.

SPEAKER_01 6:31

What is it doing?

SPEAKER_00 6:32

It's actually analyzing the microprinting that is invisible to the naked eye. It reads the holograms as they shift in the light. It decodes the barcode on the back and checks the algorithmic formatting against Department of Motor Vehicles databases. And furthermore, it uses computer vision to map your facial geometry in real time and match it to the ID, all while simultaneously detecting deep fake software or image manipulations.

SPEAKER_01 6:56

That is wild. So the AI provides this layer of forensic verification that a human sitting across a table at a coffee shop might completely miss.

SPEAKER_00 7:05

Precisely. Even if they were highly trained, a human eye can't see microprinting over a Zoom call. The technology actually enhances the security far beyond what an analog physical office could ever provide.

SPEAKER_01 7:17

Right. But you know, the paradox here is that while the tech handles all the forensic data, these notaries are still stepping into incredibly intimate human moments. Absolutely. Like if a notary is finalizing a living will at a hospital bedside, they're dealing with intense emotions, high stress, and very vulnerable people. And naturally, those people look to the professional in the room for advice.

SPEAKER_00 7:38

Always. Which brings us right into the ethical minefield of the unauthorized practice of law, or UPL. Oh yeah. This is perhaps the greatest daily risk a notary faces. By definition, a notary is an impartial witness. Unless they happen to have a law degree and have passed the bar, they are strictly prohibited from giving legal advice. Right. But the general public doesn't always understand that distinction.

SPEAKER_01 8:03

Well, it's just if you hand someone a complex legal document and you're the official there to authorize it, they just assume you know what it means.

SPEAKER_00 8:10

Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 8:11

I can see how that happens. For example, a notary cannot choose which notarial certificate to attach to a document, right? Like they can't tell a client whether they need an acknowledgement or a giraffe.

SPEAKER_00 8:22

Aaron Powell And the difference between those two is legally massive.

SPEAKER_01 8:25

Explain that a bit.

SPEAKER_00 8:26

So an acknowledgement simply means the notary confirmed your identity and that you signed the document willingly. A giraffe, however, requires the notary to administer an oath, and you must swear under penalty of perjury that the contents of the document are entirely true.

SPEAKER_01 8:42

Oh wow. That's a huge difference.

SPEAKER_00 8:44

It is. So if a notary tells a client, oh, you just need an acknowledgement for this, they have just made a legal determination. They have practiced law without a license.

SPEAKER_01 8:53

And in doing that, can actually invalidate the entire document in court. But um this linguistic confusion gets much, much darker. There is a very specific predatory danger that exploits this misunderstanding.

SPEAKER_00 9:07

Aaron Powell You're talking about the notario publico scams.

SPEAKER_01 9:09

Yes, exactly.

SPEAKER_00 9:10

This is a devastating issue, particularly within immigrant communities. It really all comes down to the difference between the common law system we use here in the U.S. and the civil law system used in many Latin American and European countries. Right. In a civil law country, an Ontario Publico is a highly trained legal professional. They're essentially a specialized lawyer. They hold immense power to draft legal documents, give complex legal advice, and formally represent clients.

SPEAKER_01 9:36

But in the United States, a notary public has absolutely none of that authority if they are just the impartial witness.

SPEAKER_00 9:42

Right. So bad actors intentionally prey on this linguistic translation. They put up a storefront, advertise themselves as a notario, and charge thousands of dollars to desperate people trying to navigate the immigration system.

SPEAKER_01 9:56

That's awful.

SPEAKER_00 9:57

They draft documents and give advice, completely ruining people's immigration cases because they have no actual legal standing.

SPEAKER_01 10:04

It's pure fraud based on a mistranslation. Which is why states like California and Texas have really stepped in to heavily regulate advertising.

SPEAKER_00 10:13

They had to.

SPEAKER_01 10:13

Yeah. If a notary advertises their services in a foreign language, the law mandates they must include a very specific, prominent disclaimer in both English and that foreign language, stating explicitly, I am not an attorney licensed to practice law and may not give legal advice.

SPEAKER_00 10:30

It is a critical consumer protection measure. The absolute line in the sand is that the notary cannot explain the legal effects of a document.

SPEAKER_01 10:37

But practically speaking, I want to look at the human dilemma this creates. Put yourself in this scenario. Okay. I'm standing by my grandmother's bedside in the ICU. She's stressed. She's trying to finalize her power attorney. And she points to a really dense paragraph and asks the notary, What does this actually mean for my house?

SPEAKER_00 10:55

Yeah, that happens a lot.

SPEAKER_01 10:56

It feels incredibly cold, almost rude, for the notary to just cross her arms and say, I can't tell you. How does a mobile notary navigate that highly emotional moment without committing UPL?

SPEAKER_00 11:09

It requires them to walk a very delicate psychological tightrope. This is where professional training really separates the amateurs from the veterans. Experienced notaries utilize strict referral scripts.

SPEAKER_01 11:20

Referral scripts.

SPEAKER_00 11:21

Yeah. They are trained to politely but firmly de-escalate the situation and remind the client of their boundaries.

SPEAKER_01 11:27

So they deflect.

SPEAKER_00 11:28

They redirect. They might say something like, As a notary, my role is to serve as an impartial witness to your signature and verify your identity. For an explanation of how this document affects your property, we really need to contact your attorney.

SPEAKER_01 11:42

That's good. It validates the client's question, but redirects them safely back to their legal counsel.

SPEAKER_00 11:46

Exactly. Which takes the pressure off the notary.

SPEAKER_01 11:49

But then what is their actual job in that hospital room, if not to explain the document?

SPEAKER_00 11:54

Their job is to assess capacity. The notary must evaluate. Is the patient alert? Are they aware of the general nature of what they are signing? And crucially, are they doing it willingly, completely free of coercion from the family members who might be standing around the bed?

SPEAKER_01 12:10

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 12:10

That is the true function of the impartial witness. Safeguarding the integrity of the act itself, protecting the vulnerable from being forced into signing away their rights.

SPEAKER_01 12:20

We're going to take a quick pause for a commercial, but when we come back, we're diving into data privacy and some really crazy scenarios from the field. All right, we are back. And that intense focus on protecting the client brings us to one of the most surprising parts of this industry data privacy. Oh, yes. Because notaries collect a massive amount of incredibly sensitive information during these signings, and the state laws regarding how they handle this data, specifically their notary journals, are completely contradictory depending on where you are in the map.

SPEAKER_00 12:50

It's a fascinating look at how different jurisdictions define privacy versus security. It really reveals the underlying legal philosophy of a state.

SPEAKER_01 12:58

Let's look at the California versus Texas paradox.

SPEAKER_00 13:01

A classic example.

SPEAKER_01 13:02

Yeah. So in California, the state is locked in a battle against real estate fraud. People were forging signatures and literally stealing houses out from underfamilies. To combat this, California law is incredibly strict. Notaries are legally required to capture a physical thumbprint in their journal whenever they notarize deeds or powers of attorney.

SPEAKER_00 13:23

It is physical, biometric proof that the specific human being was in the room.

SPEAKER_01 13:27

Right. And then you cross state lines into Texas and the philosophy flips entirely. In Texas, it is strictly prohibited for a notary to record biometric identifiers in their journal.

SPEAKER_00 13:38

They can't even write down a driver's license number.

SPEAKER_01 13:40

Why? If it stops fraud in California, why does Texas ban it?

SPEAKER_00 13:44

Because Texas is optimizing to prevent identity theft. Their legislature operated on the logic that a notary's journal is carried around in a car, into coffee shops, and into hospital.

SPEAKER_01 13:55

Right, it's highly mobile.

SPEAKER_00 13:57

Exactly. If that physical journal is lost or stolen and it contains names, addresses, driver's license numbers, and thumbprints, it instantly becomes a treasure trove for identity thieves. So one state demands the data to prevent property crime, and another state bans the data to prevent identity crime.

SPEAKER_01 14:15

And the mobile notary is caught right in the middle, strictly bound by the laws of their commissioning state. But this leads to a delightfully low-tech solution for privacy. We just talked about AI credential analysis and SOC2 data vaults, but how do notaries actually protect the privacy of previous signers in these physical logbooks?

SPEAKER_00 14:35

Physical sticky notes.

SPEAKER_01 14:36

It's amazing. Literally, a notary uses physical post-it notes to cover up the previous lines in their journal, so the current client sitting across the table can't look down and see the names, addresses, and signatures of the people who signed earlier that day.

SPEAKER_00 14:48

It's brilliantly simple. I mean, it's like having bank-level encryption, but made entirely out of brightly colored stationery. It really highlights the physical reality of the job.

SPEAKER_01 14:57

But physical reality brings physical risks, especially when dealing with attorney-client privilege. And this ties into what we often refer to as the invisibility factor in attorney partnerships, right?

SPEAKER_00 15:08

Exactly. The invisibility factor is huge. When a mobile notary is hired by a law firm to facilitate a signing at a corporate office, they are in the room, but they need to remain legally invisible.

SPEAKER_01 15:20

Because if they are sitting in the conference room while the lawyer and the client suddenly start discussing legal strategy or hiding assets, that is a massive legal hazard.

SPEAKER_00 15:28

The presence of a third party who is not bound by the attorney-client relationship can't actually shatter that privilege. Because the notary is technically a public official witnessing the event, opposing counsel could potentially subpoena the notary to testify about what they heard.

SPEAKER_01 15:43

Wow. So a professional mobile notary knows they must physically excuse themselves and step out of the room during those substantive discussions. Keep that invisibility factor intact.

SPEAKER_00 15:53

Absolutely. And their responsibility goes far beyond just what they overhear. They are handling massive amounts of non-public information or NPI. Think about a mortgage closing packet. It contains tax returns, social security numbers, bank routing information, and credit histories.

SPEAKER_01 16:11

Which makes the mobile aspect of the job terrifying. If a notary leaves a stack of those documents visible in the backseat of their car while they run into a gas station, that's a breach.

SPEAKER_00 16:20

A huge one.

SPEAKER_01 16:21

But even more common is the digital risk. Let's say the notary finishes an appointment at a coffee shop. They need to do a scan back, which is when they scan and email the signed documents back to the law firm immediately so the funds can be released. Right. If they sit there and use the public unsecured Wi-Fi network to email those PDFs, they're creating a massive security vulnerability.

SPEAKER_00 16:43

Anyone on that public network with basic packet sniffing software can intercept that data. Mishandling NPI like that can lead to severe regulatory penalties to the law firm and massive civil liability for the notary.

SPEAKER_01 16:55

So what's the standard protocol?

SPEAKER_00 16:56

They were required to use virtual private networks, encrypted file sharing portals, and physical locked bags when transporting documents.

SPEAKER_01 17:04

Which actually brings us to a segment we love doing here. Good question. What would you do?

SPEAKER_00 17:09

Oh, I love these. These are the real-world scenarios from the field.

SPEAKER_01 17:12

Exactly. Quick, rapid-fire situations. Let's see how you'd handle them. First up, we have Violet in Texas. She's notarizing a will at a client's house, and the signer's pet parrot keeps squawking, perfectly mimicking the signer's voice saying, No, don't sign.

SPEAKER_00 17:28

Okay, that is hilarious. But you do. Well, as a professional, your job is to assess the human signer. If the human is clearly competent, willing, and laughing it off, you proceed. You ignore the bird. The parrot is not under oath.

SPEAKER_01 17:42

Fair enough. Okay, Eli in Maine. He finishes a signing, but a sudden, massive snowstorm traps him inside the client's house for three hours.

SPEAKER_00 17:50

Oh wow. Well, you have to maintain professional boundaries. Lean into that invisibility factor. Secure the documents in your locked bag. Act as a courteous guest, but do not start dispensing legal advice over hot cocoa.

SPEAKER_01 18:02

Good call. Next, Aurora in Washington. A client accidentally spills a huge cup of coffee all over the freshly signed and stamped documents.

SPEAKER_00 18:11

Yeah, that's an immediate redo. You cannot submit illegible or stained documents for recording, especially if the notary seal itself is compromised. You have to print a fresh set and start over.

SPEAKER_01 18:20

All right, Julian in Alabama. He shows up for a mobile signing in a residence, and the signer answers the door completely naked.

SPEAKER_00 18:27

Yeah. Um, absolutely not. Safety and professional dignity come first. You politely decline to enter, ask them to reschedule when appropriately dressed, and you leave immediately.

SPEAKER_01 18:37

I would hope so. Okay, last one. Sadie in Oklahoma. She's doing an agricultural loan signing on a farm, and a literal bull gets loose in the yard and is charging around.

SPEAKER_00 18:47

I mean, get in the car, the documents can wait, a notary stamp will not stop a charging bull. Safety first, always.

SPEAKER_01 18:54

Excellent advice. But dealing with all these wild scenarios, plus the hypermobility, strict UPL boundaries, contradictory privacy laws, and the constant threat of an NPI data breach. How on earth do law firms actually manage this chaos? How does a law firm dispatch a mobile notary without completely dropping the ball?

SPEAKER_00 19:14

Well, you certainly can't manage this level of complexity with spreadsheets and phone calls anymore. The legal industry has evolved to rely on specialized interconnected software ecosystems. Law firms utilize robust practice management platforms like Clio, which integrates directly through APIs with notary-specific platforms like OneNotary or DocuSign.

SPEAKER_01 19:34

Oh, so it creates a closed loop system.

SPEAKER_00 19:36

Precisely. A paralegal doesn't just call a notary and hope for the best. They build a digital workflow. They use detailed digital intake forms within these systems to capture every single parameter of the signing before it ever happens.

SPEAKER_01 19:48

Give me an example.

SPEAKER_00 19:49

For example, some county clerk offices use incredibly old optical scanners that cannot read blue ink. They will reject a deed entirely if it isn't signed in black. Yeah, so the intake form flags this. It tracks the exact location parameters, whether separate witnesses are required by state law, and exactly which certificates are needed.

SPEAKER_01 20:07

So the notary arrives perfectly prepared, having already reviewed the digital brief. And once the signing is done, the digital record of the journal entry, the secure scamback of the documents, and the invoicing all flow automatically back into the law firm's central system without ever touching an unsecured email server.

SPEAKER_00 20:27

It entirely removes the friction and the security gaps. And looking toward the horizon, the legal tech is getting even more aggressive in preventing human error. We are seeing the rise of agentic AI artificial intelligence agents that act autonomously within these workflows.

SPEAKER_01 20:42

Right, because an average commercial loan packet can be, what, 200 pages long?

SPEAKER_00 20:46

Right.

SPEAKER_01 20:46

With dozens of places requiring a tiny initial or signature.

SPEAKER_00 20:50

And humans get tired. But an AI agent can scan thousands of pages of a complex mortgage package and flag a missing signature line or a contradictory date before the notary meeting even happens.

SPEAKER_01 21:02

That's incredible.

SPEAKER_00 21:03

It is. It scrubs the document for structural integrity. Combine that with blockchain technology, which is increasingly being used to create immutable, unchangeable digital ledgers of notarized deeds. Once the document is notarized and hashed onto the blockchain, it is mathematically impossible to alter it without leaving a glaring digital footprint.

SPEAKER_01 21:24

It establishes an absolutely unbroken chain of custody. But, you know, this brings up a massive philosophical question for me.

SPEAKER_00 21:31

Okay, let's hear it.

SPEAKER_01 21:32

If agentic AI can flawlessly analyze the document and computer vision can perfectly verify the signer's ID and the blockchain permanently secures the record, does the human notary eventually just become completely obsolete? Are we simply automating away the impartial witness?

SPEAKER_00 21:48

It's the logical conclusion to draw from all this tech, but I strongly disagree.

SPEAKER_01 21:52

Why is that?

SPEAKER_00 21:52

We have to look at what is actually being authenticated. AI is a brilliant tool for detecting technical and forensic discrepancies. It can tell you with near certainty if an idea is fake and it can catch a missed initial on page 142. But the indispensable core of the notarial act isn't forensic, it is human judgment.

SPEAKER_01 22:10

You're talking about the willingness and the awareness of the hospital room scenario we talked about earlier.

SPEAKER_00 22:15

Exactly. AI cannot look a vulnerable elderly person in the eye and evaluate their true mental capacity. It cannot accurately read the subtle, terrifying emotional cues of coercion from an abusive family member who might be standing intentionally just out of frame of the webcam.

SPEAKER_01 22:34

That's a really good point.

SPEAKER_00 22:35

Technology supports the process, it secures the data and verifies the physical identity. But ultimately, it is the human being who verifies the intent. The tech verifies the data, but the human verifies the soul of the agreement.

SPEAKER_01 22:49

That is a profound distinction. The notary is the guardian of the intent. It's incredible to see how this role has evolved from a stationary clerk with a stamp into a highly mobile, digitally secure, operative, navigating complex ethics and cutting-edge software, all to ensure that when we sign on the dotted line, it actually means something.

SPEAKER_00 23:07

And as we move forward, the implications of this hypermobile digitized authentication get even more fascinating. Oh, so think about the rise of deepfakes, decentralized autonomous organizations, and network states. We are entering an era where people might live, work, and amass vast fortunes entirely online, completely untethered from a physical nation state.

SPEAKER_01 23:29

Right, like sovereign digital citizens operating outside of traditional borders.

SPEAKER_00 23:33

Exactly. If your assets, your contracts, and your entire legal identity exist entirely in the cloud across multiple jurisdictions, how does the law handle the physical reality of witnessing a life event? Will the concept of an impartial physical witness survive when humanity expands to a purely post-national legal system? We might soon need to invent an entirely new framework for how human intent is proven when the physical world is no longer the center of our legal reality.

SPEAKER_01 24:00

That is definitely something to think about.

SPEAKER_00 24:02

It really is.

SPEAKER_01 24:03

Well, we want to remind everyone email your questions to Derek at dereksbruel.com. We will try to answer as soon as possible at the end of our shows.

SPEAKER_00 24:09

Keep those questions coming.

SPEAKER_01 24:10

And a quick shout out to our incredible team: executive producer Derek Spruel, lead writer Marilyn Lee Trotter, graphics by Eddie Montez Travis, music by Thomas Bynum, and produced by Magnificent Work Business Solutions.

SPEAKER_00 24:23

An amazing team.

SPEAKER_01 24:24

So the next time you see that tiny rubber stamp head of piece of paper, remember the massive complex machinery it's holding together. Don't just be listeners of the knowledge, be doers of the knowledge. This is notary knowledge. Until next time.

SPEAKER_02 24:39

Are you looking for an edge, flexible income, and immediate professional respect? Discover the hidden opportunity of becoming a public official with the book, Becoming a Notary by Derek Spool. This beginner's guide provides the universal roadmap to launch your new career. You will learn the core mission of deterring fraud, the essential tools of the trade, and exactly how to protect yourself while building a respected business. Get your copy of Becoming a Notary on Amazon and step into a rewarding profession.