Image: Digital Vision
Two years after new federal e-discovery rules, 30 percent of companies have no policies for preserving evidence for litigation discovery, according to a new Deloitte Financial Advisory Services poll of in-house lawyers and executives.
Developing a policy is relatively inexpensive, so it's surprising that such a large percentage of U.S. corporations have yet to ink policies for so-called legal holds, or the process of preserving documents subject to litigation discovery, said Jeff Seymour, a principal in Deloitte FAS's analytic and forensic technology practice, in a statement.
"While the discovery process has become increasingly complex and therefore poses a significant challenge for corporate America, having no legal hold policy is a significant risk factor for companies," Seymour said, in a statement.
Responding to discovery requests has become more expensive in the past year according to 30 percent of survey participants. And 33 percent percent of participants say it's become more complex.
Comprehensive amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, concerning e-discovery, took effect on Dec. 1, 2006.
Companies hit with discovery requests need to pull electronic data from numerous sources, including voicemail, e-mail, text messaging and instant messaging, said Bruce Hartley, a director in Deloitte FAS's analytic and forensic technology practice, in a statement.
"Our corporate [information technology] infrastructure tends to replicate much of that data, furthering the continued and rapid increase in electronically stored data volumes," stated Hartley.
Deloitte hired market research company Bayer Consulting to conduct an online survey of 114 in-house lawyers and corporate executives in June.
Respondents were spread fairly evenly among four different company sizes: 26 percent each from small companies with less than $100 million in annual revenue or huge corporations with more than $5 billion in annual sales; 21 percent from companies with sales in the $100 million to $1 billion range; and 27 percent from companies with sales from $1 billion to $5 billion.
Subscribe to The National Law Journal
