Most law firms have information governance (IG) policies to determine document lifecycle and the limits of document retention, but they fail to implement the strategy or do so in an inconsistent manner. Big mistake. Firms that retain client information long after matters are closed, and documents reach the outer limits of retention, overpay for the cost of maintaining physical records and increase the risk that old client data, even corporate secrets, may be exposed to unauthorized access from e-discovery, a data breach, or malicious insider activity.
Client documents may also find their way beyond the law firm boundaries to e-discovery repositories, shared drives, and Web-based file-sharing services where they are no longer subject to retention policies. Out of sight and out of mind until a hacker, insider, or litigant brings them to the firm’s attention. If you’re looking for a silver bullet for these problems, investigate FileTrail’s Governance Policy Suite (GPS), a purpose-built, Web-based platform designed to implement information governance (IG) and retention policies on physical and electronic records. GPS automatically classifies and applies retention policies to documents and automates the disposition, review, and destruction of documents with built-in workflows, email notifications, audit trails, and reports.
