While the judicial systems in virtually every country clung to the traditional standards of in-person hearings and hardcopy submissions, the world of arbitration had already introduced, if not fully implemented, new technologies to maximise efficiency in the arbitral process prior to the emergence of COVID-19. In Canada and the United States most practitioners were, at best, uncomfortable with virtual legal proceedings, preferring the ‘authenticity’ of in-person communication, and the accompanying security of the capacity of the neutrals, lawyers, experts, and witnesses to be effective. The pandemic suddenly thrust every legal practitioner and institution firmly into the 21^st century, requiring a profession often resistant to change to adopt technology in order to function.