An attorney is advising insurers and law firms to take immediate action after Lex Machina Inc. released new federal district and appellate court data that pinpointed multiple litigation trends.

Ron Porter, a legal data expert in product liability at Lex Machina, said the insurance litigation report focused on the five years from 2017 to 2021.  During that period, 2021 accounted for the most federal case filings, nearly 14,800, of any year since 2009 when Lex Machina began tracking the data.

"Overall, Insurance litigation is up 47% from 2017 to 2021, which is a substantial increase," Porter said while noting a caveat about the data: The coronavirus pandemic also impacted the data, particularly in business interruption. For example, business interruption cases peaked in 2020, and were 3.7% higher than the previous high in 2014.

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Michael A. Mora

Michael A. Mora

Michael was born and raised in South Florida. He went to undergrad at Florida Atlantic University and earned his master's degree from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. He is the crypto litigation reporter for Law.com, as well as an editor for ALM Global. You can email him at [email protected].

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