Data Retention: Will Courts Drive Information Governance?
October 2, 2011
Beleaguered search and content processing vendors are chasing market segments where there is money. The vendors’ systems may not be well suited to address niche specific requirements, but that have not stopped purveyors of findability fantasies in the past.
I read an interesting article the other day in the field of electronic discovery. According to Proactive Retention Means Effective Preservation in eDiscovery, legal costs and court sanctions can be effectively reduced by implementing an information governance strategy.
The article sites a recent industry survey and several 2011 legal cases from across that country to drive home the point that better data retention practices yield more successful document preservation results. Writer Philip Favros states that in the case of Haraburda v. Arcelor Mittal U.S.A. inc:
“…The court tied a litigant’s preservation duty to its document retention efforts. In order to discharge its duty to reactively preserve evidence, the court reasoned that enterprises must proactively create ‘a ‘comprehensive’ document retention policy that will ensure that relevant documents are retained.’ Failing to implement a retention policy often results in a loss of key information. And this, opined the court, may result in sanctions.”
With the hoo-hah about governance choking SharePoint and other special interest information services, are we now at the point where courts will force organizations to get their data management, editorial processes, and records management methods in working order? What’s obvious is that a general purpose search system is ill suited to cope with the type of information requirements the legal processes require. Ad hoc “index it now, to find out if we are guilty” methods are easy to sell to those who wonder, “Are we guilty?” However, the slap dash approach can add friction to an organization’s response to a legal matter. Marketing is of little help when the fines and sanctions arrive. Where are those marketers? Probably playing golf or pitching fantasy solutions to another market segment. Will the azure chip consultants pinpoint such situations? Nah, those folks are worrying about billable hours and writing reports about “governance”. Good work for English majors, failed Web masters, retooled librarians, and those who should be making cookies.
Jasmine Ashton, October 2, 2011
Sponsored by Pandia.com
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