NYSBA Releases E-Discovery Best Practices Guidelines

The New York State Bar Association has issued a free guide to help attorneys and others understand and work through both New York state and federal courts' electronic discovery requirements.  In the works for much of 2011, the recently approved 47-page guide, entitled Best Practices In E-Discovery in New York State and Federal Courts, is the work of the NYSBA's E-Discovery Committee of the Commercial and Federal Litigation Section and contains 14 separate "guidelines," a detailed glossary and bibliography for further information. The guidelines are organized in a systematic fashion - covering topics applicable to electronically stored information ("ESI") before, during and after e-discovery has occurred - and include coverage of legal holds, adequate preservation and investigations, the duty to preserve, forms of production, inadvertent alteration, allocation of ESI production costs, ESI tools, sanctions for evidence spoilation, the devices and types of information that need to be considered in today's highly mobile environment and what lawyers should discuss with their clients as to the ability to retain and retrieve ESI.

To discuss the NYSBA's ESI best practices and the potential impact on your own ESI requirements or data information security systems and policies, feel free to contact any of the attorneys at the InfoLawGroup.