Cutting the Cost Of e-Discovery

So, let's take a look at how we can cut those costs down to size, while still saving everything that needs to be saved. For starters, here are four key steps for taking control over the cost of preserving and processing electronic data for litigation.

• Weed out the trash. There may be a vast amount of e-data in the company's backup system, but most of it is unnecessary or redundant. A thoughtful approach can relegate backup data to its intended purpose, disaster recovery, not ad hoc data preservation and retention. For existing backup sets where no alternative source exists for data related to a specific litigation, analysis, sampling and testing, can weed out most, if not all, of that unwanted data, with the company paying only to process what's potentially relevant. In a large case, excluding irrelevant and redundant data can result in millions of dollars in savings.
• Adopt smarter data recovery methods. Companies are storing vast amounts of data ' 100 or more gigabytes of data on a single hard drive, the equivalent of millions and millions of pages of printed data! But just as data storage is getting cheaper and easier, so is data recovery. For example, you can now extract data from a backup tape without going through the time consuming and costly process of recreating the exact environment or system from which it was backed up. What's more, the discovery process keeps improving. The newest search tools and techniques enable legal teams to cull out irrelevant data quickly, leaving more time for in-depth review of data that is pertinent to the case. Cost savings are significant because there is less need to pay high-priced reviewers to waste hours and hours looking at irrelevant or duplicative data.
• Tailor the method to the case. Some vendors tell corporate counsel that there is only one right way to process e-data (and it costs a lot!). The truth is that companies can adapt their methods to the value, size and timeline of the case, the type of data, and most importantly the size of a reasonable discovery budget. Tailoring the method to the case may require calling upon expert advice, but the savings gained by eliminating unnecessary processing and attorney review time make the investment well worthwhile.
• Do what is reasonable. Too many companies accept as valid the claim that the cost of electronic discovery should be based simply on the amount of data and the cost of processing that data. In fact, according to basic discovery principles, such as those found in the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, a party is obligated to do what is “reasonable” for the case, not everything “possible.” Many litigants and electronic discovery vendors approach the problem as a question of “how much will it cost to process my data?” Under the rules and the case law, a more appropriate question would be, “Based on the value of the case and the deadlines, what is a reasonable budget and approach for electronic discovery?”

Why Preserve Electronic Data?

When you boil it down, there are really just three reasons for corporations to preserve any data: operations, litigation and regulation. Let's take a look at all three and see where companies can realize significant savings and avoid the risk of being caught unprepared.