Our Insights on eDiscovery

We like to believe that there will never be any problems with the data that we preserve, collect and process for eDiscovery purposes. Sometimes, however, critical data may be difficult or impossible to use. Perhaps key files are password protected from being opened and the only way to open them is to “crack” the password. Or, perhaps a key file may be corrupted. If that file is an Outlook Personal Storage Table (PST) file, that file corruption could literally make tens of thousands of documents unavailable for discovery unless the file can be repaired.

With back to back weeks of political party conventions leading up to the elections in November, nominations are in the forefront of the minds of many Americans these days (at least those not watching the Giants and Cowboys kicking off the NFL season!). It’s an important time for our country. While not quite on a par with the presidential nomination, ABA Journal is currently asking for nominations for the best 100 legal blawgs, er, blogs.

As we discussed last October, the state of Florida has been working to adopt new rules regarding handling of eDiscovery. Earlier this summer, the Supreme Court of Florida approved eDiscovery rule amendments that were proposed by the Florida Bar’s Civil Procedure Rules Standing Committee. The amendments to address Electronically Stored Information (ESI) generally follow the 2006 amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, are entirely contained within existing Rules 1.200, 1.201, 1.280, 1.340, 1.350, 1.380 and 1.410 of the Florida Rules of Civil Procedure and went into effect this past Saturday, September 1.

Law Technology News had an interesting article regarding a DEA criminal case written by Ryan J. Foley (Two Terabytes Too Much Evidence for DEA). Let’s discuss the scenario.