[conspire] email retention [was Re: VPN]

[Tony Godshall]

"The Supreme Court has ruled that a warrant is required to search the
contents of computers, cell phones, and other devices. Cloud storage
remains a subject of contention, with different courts reaching different
conclusions."
https://www.justia.com/criminal/procedure/warrant-requirement/


On Mon, Dec 6, 2021, 5:39 PM Rick Moen <rick at linuxmafia.com> wrote:

> Quoting Tony Godshall (togo at of.net):
>
> > The legal distinction is probably the issue in this case, where recent
> > email is considered protected communications while old email is
> > considered a digital archive, requiring less of a warrant, I recall
> > this being the case in the USA, but am hazy on the details, and I am
> > not a lawyer, and obviously all legal matters depend on jurisdiction,
> > and one should not take such guidelines at face value without a better
> > legal analysis of one's own situation, such as where one lives, where
> > the data lives, and which laws bind the corporation holding your data.
>
> We're all outside our areas of competence on our matters, none of us
> being attorneys.  That implicit disclaimer having been made:
> My understanding is that there is no such strict dividing line, not at
> 90 days or anywhere else.
>
> Corporate best practices suggest that there _should_ be an in-force,
> enforced retention period for e-mails, which may for diverse reasons
> differ between departments and functions.  As a general, rule, long
> policies also increase your company’s exposure to legal examination that
> focuses on conversations and decisions captured in e-mails, within the
> "discovery" process of civil litigation.  Short e-mail policies avert
> that problem, but introduce other problems such as interfering with
> collective memory and effective documentation of the context for actions
> taken -- and also, occasionally, Federal, state, local, and/or industry
> requirements may interpose a minimum period.
>
> Having explicit, documented retention (which also means erasure)
> policies protects the firm against claims of "spoilage" of evidence, if
> the firm is sued -- in the sense that the firm can cite the policy and
> say "Hey, we weren't hiding anything; we were just carrying out a normal
> erasure policy."  (In other words, deleting mail _absent_ a policy
> could look furtive, and implementing a longstanding policy averts that
> perception problem.)  That notwithstanding, it's also true that any
> moment a firm reasonably anticipates being a party to litigation on a
> matter, it has a legal obligation to _suspend_ for the duration any such
> policy on any matters relevant to pending litigation.
>
> Anyway, I haven't found the new Google policy Paul is referring to.
> Perhaps he could cite it.
>
>
>
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