On January 11th in the case of Bank of Montreal Judge, Scheindlin issued a very important opinion. Judge Scheindlin’s opinion tie closely to the famous Zubulake case. In this event, the legal teams went into the case not prepared with the relevant ESI. The judge found them negligent – and ruled that if they cannot find data online in corporate networks they must to go to backup tapes. What this means for law firms or enterprises is to put more emphasis on ESI collection, including backup tapes, or face negligence fines down the road. Combine the weight of Schendlin’s opinion with Craig Ball’s most recent white paper, which proposed that backup tape might actually be the best place to conduct eDiscovery due to the tamper-proof nature, and what you have is a shift in the importance of tape discovery in the market. If the courts mirror Scheindlin’s sentiments, and eDiscovery experts adopt Ball’s beliefs, then tape is going to become a focal point for future eDiscovery. With new technology, such as Index Engines, making the search and collection of tape data, fast, easy and cost effective, it really is only a matter of time, until tapes are considered the next generation of legal hold.
