The regulation of professionals in the digital age

As we have seen in previous chapters, the nature of professional work has changed considerably in recent times. Perhaps the most profound changes have been due to the increasing reliance which professionals place upon computing and communications technologies for their daily practice. Professionals' use of information technologies extends from simple reliance upon telephones, through communications by facsimile and electronic mail, to the most advanced forms of communication and the dissemination of information using the Internet and teleconferencing facilities. Professional records relating to clients and billing are also now regularly recorded on computerised databases.