Features - Enterprise Data Insights:

CORPORATE, LEGAL IMPLICATIONS OF E-MAIL MGMT A SERIOUS ISSUE

The "Information Age" has forever changed the way companies do business. E-mail has become so commonplace that it is hard to imagine getting along without it. This year, Americans will send and receive well over 6.8 trillion e-mail messages -- approximately 2.2 billion messages each day -- compared with just 293 million pieces of first class mail. Roughly two-thirds of all American workers use e-mail as part of their daily routine and the average office worker will send and receive between 60 and 200 e-mail messages each day.

Although a portion of this e-mail is sent and received by individuals, most of the traffic travels via corporate e-mail servers. Regardless of the statistics cited or their source, this fact remains: e-mail has been rapidly and widely adopted by corporations to conduct critical business functions and has replaced written documents, faxes and even the telephone as the primary communication conduit.

The shift to electronic mail has been made more multifarious by ubiquitous business software like Microsoft Word and Excel. Corporate users now have the ability to create a variety of digital correspondence that once was found only on paper. Often, these documents are sent and received via e-mail as file attachments. As a result, the importance and complexity of e-mail has evolved from simple text messages into a multitude of mission-critical correspondence. Vital corporate documents -- negotiations, bids, proposals, contracts, legal agreements, regulatory forms, etc -- that were once mailed, filed, copied and shredded now frequently find their way to recipients via e-mail.

Legal Risk And Corporate Responsibility

The prominence of e-mail in organizations has amplified corporate legal responsibility in unexpected ways. E-mail is essentially a "corporate memory" of how an organization conducts itself and courts in the United States, as well as many other countries, have ruled that messages and files relating to potential litigation must be preserved as evidence. Trial lawyers often look to e-mail as the "smoking gun" that will win their case or force a settlement. As a result, ability to save, search and comprehend corporate e-mail stores with effectiveness and ease is imperative in order to mitigate risk during litigation.

In addition, e-mail has also drawn attention from the regulators of such industries as healthcare, financial, pharmaceutical and others. Organizations in these industries are faced with rules such as SEC Rule 17a-4, NASD Rules 3010 and 3110, NYSE Rules 342 and 440, HIPPA, Sarbanes-Oxley and many others that require the long-term, secure retention of e-mail and other electronic communications.

Fading Sense Of Security

Most companies have tried and true policies and procedures in place for paper records, but they may have a false sense of security when it comes to the legal implications of e-mail. A study conducted by the American Bar Association found that more than 80 percent of the companies they surveyed did not have a policy on how they would handle e-mail discovery requests. And it may not be safe to assume that information technology systems reliably retain and manage e-mail records. IT managers typically struggle with the growing volume of e-mail records that clog their networks and storage farms, but when a company faces a lawsuit, the IT department is faced with the daunting challenges of information discovery. Consequently, when a court order for corporate e-mail is handed down, compliance is likely to be an economic and operational nightmare if not downright impossible.

E-mail management and information discovery can put corporate management at odds. Typically, IT departments focus on preserving data, but may find that deleting e-mail is the only way to curb rising storage constraints and administration costs. Corporate attorneys may welcome the "just delete it" approach as a way to minimize exposure, but business unit leaders may feel that they are left unprotected. As a result, a corporation's interests can become misaligned in the melee.

Ultimately, companies must rely on the IT group to find and retrieve e-mail records in order to comply with a discovery mandate. This job can become perilous once litigation is pending since data cannot be deleted or destroyed without risk of severe penalty. Often IT administrators are caught off guard, unaware that their company is involved in a lawsuit until after the fact. As a result, e-mail data may continue to be purged unwittingly and therefore expose the company to legal penalties and an unfavorable perception in the eyes of the court.

E-mail Management Strategy

The legal implications associated with e-mail are significant. In order to mitigate these risks and adhere to corporate data retention responsibilities companies must have the ability to effectively retain and retrieve e-mail. Corporate e-mail policy should ensure that message retention is based on clear, proactive decision-making and not simply a set of ad hoc guidelines. A strategic mindset concerning e-mail archive management, along with new technological tools to enable corporate e-mail archive strategies, is needed to accomplish this objective.

ZANTAZ offers two solutions to this corporate need. Exchange Archive Solution (EAS) an on-site software product designed maximize server performance and improve storage utilization all the while archiving e-mail in a logical and easily accessible format. Digital Safe, a hosted service that meets the compliance requirements of regulated industries such as financial services, insurance, pharmaceuticals, energy, telecom and others, as well as government agencies.

Only by implementing a comprehensive e-mail archive strategy, and technology that can effectively enable that strategy, can organizations mitigate the risk e-mail presents in the Information Age.

About ZANTAZ

ZANTAZ is a provider of end-to-end e-communications management solutions for compliance, electronic discovery and storage management. ZANTAZ solutions help clients protect their intellectual property, efficiently comply with industry regulations, respond to urgent litigation, and reduce e-mail server load. ZANTAZ delivers customer-driven solutions to a broad set of vertical markets. These solutions enable companies to better manage business risk, enhance user access to information and strengthen legal and regulatory compliance. For further information, visit www.zantaz.com, or call (800)636-0095.