Electronic discovery

Electronic discovery (e-discovery/ediscovery)
is the process in which electronic data is sought, retrieved, secured, and searched through, with the intention of eliciting relevant information for use as evidence in a civil or criminal legal case.

Electronic data of many types can serve as evidence within the ediscovery process, including; email, text, calendar files, databases, spreadsheets, audio files, Web sites, and computer programs.

Literally millions of documents may form the basis of an eDiscovery project. When litigation is pending, the challenge is to elicit and preserve all of the case relevant information, so that it can be made potentially available to both sides of the dispute.

Although often highly complex, the process of ediscovery can be broken down into 6 essential stages:

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Stage 1.
Planning
To define the aims of eDisclosure within the context of the relevant legal case.

Once a triggering event occurs that puts a client in anticipation of litigation, it becomes important to identify the location of all relevant information. During this stage, lawyers and clients will need to identify the custodians of the data, determine the time frames involved, identify the types of documents that are relevant to the case, and map the client's information systems.

Stage 2.
Preservation and collection
To investigate the available data and to retrieve/securely maintain information from each targeted electronic data source.

Stage 3.
Processing
To Cull through the retrieved electronic data, extracting relevant information only.

Stage 4.
Reviewing
To Identify the most effective way of presenting the relevant data – and to make it available in the appropriate format.

Once the data is reviewed, Lawyers can then begin to formulate strategy and apply evidence to the legal issues before them.

Stage 5.
Production
To distribute/present the retrieved data to relevant parties within the litigation process

Stage 6.
Presentation
To use the electronic evidence (elicited by eDiscovery) at the relevant trial, settlement negotiation or tribunal.

It is highly advisable that best practices are applied in the process of ediscovery. Failure to follow the correct procedures may affect the integrity of the evidence, potentially making it inadmissible.

For large scale and complex ediscovery tasks, third party specialist teams are nearly always brought in to ensure the process runs smoothly and at all times within approved guidelines.