The Supreme Court approved an amendment to the federal rules of civil procedure effective December 1, 2006, targeting companies under litigation. These companies must maintain all employee’s electronic information including e-mails and instant messages. 

Approved in April 2006, and effective today, companies under litigation are required by law to provide (to the other party) names, addresses, and telephone numbers to any individual within the company who may have ascertainable information that the disclosing party may use to support its claims or defenses.

In addition to this, the company must provide a copy of, or a location of all documents electronically stored, and physical things that are within possession of their employees until the claim is resolved.

While the term “electronically stored information” is not properly defined in this case, it is assumed to mean all information that can be created, modified, stored, and shared on any digital medium including hard drives, memory sticks, cell phones, and any portable storage device.

Once companies adopt a method for retrieving and saving data, whether it be by choice or by force, they may not be as apt to retire such a system. This is, in turn, raising employee’s fears of companies digging around their personal documents. There have been thousands of reported cases involving employees loosing their jobs as a result of just sending e-mail’s while at work; the largest part of the problem is that they are uneducated, and not aware of the ethics in this matter.

When sending e-mails, instant messages, and the such at work; keep it strictly business, and remember, don’t send anything over a digital medium that you wouldn’t want someone else to see.

Related:

Entry was posted on Friday, December 1st, 2006 at 3:17 pm under Legal, Opinion, Security.

Read more entries by George Gardner.
Stumble It!