New rules just put in effect will make e-mails more useful as evidence in lawsuits, but e-mail systems costlier to maintain. See box below for information on a special audio conference explaining this and other key federal employment law changes for 2007.
It was the smoking gun that blew away the giant Arthur Andersen accounting firm and had domestic diva Martha Stewart doing her decorating in the “big house.” And now it can be more easily pointed at you.
We’re talking about the incriminating e-mail, of course. That innocent little message that isn’t so innocent, because it contains evidence of lawbreaking by the sender or his or her organization.
If regulatory officials or plaintiffs in a lawsuit against your company suspect you might have such an e-mail in your files, new judicial rules involving e-mail evidence will now make it easier for them to find. The rules, now in effect, may also make your e-mail system more complex and expensive to maintain. Here’s what they call for:
–An End to “Virtual Shredding.” It’s common practice for IT departments to delete e-mails en masse once a predetermined time has elapsed since their creation. This is now illegal if litigation is pending or even expected. Companies must indefinitely maintain their electronic documents just as they do paper ones if they have evidentiary potential. You can dump old e-mail if there’s no legal situation on the horizon.
–Find Files Faster! Because electronic evidence must now be brought in to court cases earlier in the judicial procedure, companies need to keep better track of what is where on their hard drives. New filing systems may be called for.
–See the Legal Bills Mount. Lawyers will now have to review a lot more e-mail for relevancy before they’re allowed to turn the material over to a court. (All those hours will be billable, of course.)
There are electronic means of searching files more efficiently. But they’re not cheap either. Searching 10 gigabytes of data (a few hard drives’ worth) can cost $50,000.
Of course, the best way to avoid all this is to have a strong policy controlling the writing of sensitive information in e-mails, coupled with training on the fact that the “delete” button does not destroy e-mail, but only stores it in a different place. Experts also suggest an ongoing surveillance program, headed by HR, but involving IT, finance, and senior management. That way you can read about and take care of any problems before they ever reach the courts.
To learn more about this audio conference, or to register or pre-order a CD, click here.