It is my understanding that even if you are destroying e-mail records 
according to a legally validated retention schedule, those e-mails can still 
be retrieved in court cases etc since they never really go away, just 
sitting out there somewhere is cyberland waiting to be caught.


not anly that but that buthe indexies to that information will need to be 
made available.

As a result our IT department is leaning towards keeping everything 
indefinitely, saying why bother trying to cover e-mails with retention 
schedules.

unfortunately this is nothing new. IT folks have been scampereing around 
this concept for quite a while. From there perspective it make great sense. 
First and formemost it helps to shorten the ROI on their investments (time 
personnel equipment, etc.). It has never been a good idea the only apeal it 
really has is it is simple. Once you tke management of the information out 
of the equation (from a Records management perspective) life gets a lot 
easier.

How do you handle this

Having been a geek I am telling you that your only real hope of convincing 
folks is not in the IT realm. You have to convince the business, legal, and 
audit folks, you know your peers, that you have the correct viewpoint. 
Eventually it comes down to have to and want to. Show the the need adn make 
the requirment. Force the solution if you have to.

and is there a way to delete e-mails so that they are "really destroyed" and 
cannot be retrieved in any situations?

We have discussed this on the list a bit. Some dispute over whether to use 
12 guage slugs or 45/70 I am a 45/70 guy.


If not is there any legal advantage to covering e-mail records with the 
retention schedule, even if they can be retrieved after "destruction"?


It may show intent. I don't know how much that will help you but there is 
that. My recomendation is use a system that allows you to manange the 
records through the entire lifecycle. Make sure that whatever certificate of 
destruction you receive from your IT folks stipulates that the record had 
been disposed of in entirety.

if you cannot ensure the disposal of records out of your system it probably 
should not be used.


Chris Flynn

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