On Wed, Feb 15, 2012 at 1:04 PM, PeterK <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Delete Your Emails or Preserve Your Emails?
> Even if a company decided to implement a policy to delete old email
> archives, no IT department can absolutely guarantee every version and
> iteration of an electronic record can be scrubbed. It’s wishful thinking
> that A) IT is that competent and B) the “find and destroy” technologies are
> that reliable. It’s not a knock against either IT or technology, just an
> honest recognition of the state of electronic record keeping.
>
> Source:
> http://blog.sonian.com/bid/82450/Delete-Your-Emails-or-Preserve-Your-Emails
>

Obviously, the person who wrote the post on the Sonian site and the
embedded link to the TechCrunch article are NOT records management
professionals, nor are they familiar with RM policies, practices or the
FRCP.

There is a lot of 'opinion' in both of the posts and very little "fact".

The snippet below has the worst of it included:

First, it refers to an email repository as an "archive", which it is not in
RM terms... and unless it's dated information removed form an on-line
storage environment because it is no longer regularly used, it isn't even
an 'archive' in IT terms.

Second, if a company implemented "a policy to delete old email" and
followed it uniformly based on the content of the email, as long as they
had satisfied required retention and weren't related to pending litigation,
they would be within their rights.

Third, *IF* IT wanted to establish a set of practices to ensure "every
version and iteration of an electronic record" was deleted, it's *NOT* that
difficult- you eliminate any local storage, store all content on servers
that users cannot delete or save content locally from, backup content from
set time periods, and recycle all of those backups according to a rigid
schedule.

If anyone thinks A) their IT is *NOT* that competent and B) they are
relying on “find and destroy” technologies to do this work, then they don't
have a good relationship wit their IT department, or they haven't sat down
and discussed the requirements for information governance as an
organization.

Lastly, if the writers think this article is "an honest recognition of the
state of electronic record keeping", they are WAY behind the times.  Record
keeping, regardless of media, form or format is able to establish policies
and practices to adequately manage all content to the level any
organization needs if the proper governance model is put in place.  It
doesn't happen 'automagically' and it isn't cheap, but once established and
managed properly, it will result in reduced costs and effort, and a
defensible set of practices.

Oh and as for the comment in the TC article "Once an investigation starts
and the prospect of subpoenas arise, destroying emails is no longer a legal
option." they need to brush up on the FRCP... once you have any REASONABLE
SUSPICION that an investigation may start or a legal action MAY take place,
THAT's when it's time to discontinue destruction... you can't wait until an
investigation starts.

Larry
[log in to unmask]
-- 
*Lawrence J. Medina
Danville, CA
RIM Professional since 1972*

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