Up Close and Personal with Metadata- Part I
As technology has advanced, enterprises and organizations have started managing a lot of electronic data. As a result, the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (FRCP), which addresses civil law suits, was amended to include court procedures regarding the disclosure of electronically stored information. Hence, electronic discovery services came to be known as the process of retaining, preserving, and processing of electronically stored information. As if it was not causing enough worry for enterprises and organizations caught in the maze of various litigation laws, a recent ruling has made it necessary for companies to produce metadata in legal cases as well.
The ruling was made in the lawsuit of Aguilar v. Immigration & Customs Enforcement Division of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which made it very clear that, going forward, enterprises and organizations must preserve, maintain, and produce the metadata of email messages and other electronic data in court if requested by the opposing party. Failing this, companies could face huge penalties for being non-compliant. This has added to the woes of enterprises and organizations already grappling with issues related to electronic discovery.
What is Metadata?
Simply put, metadata is data about data and refers to the history of an electronic document. It plays a significant role in verifying the authenticity of electronic documents and files. It provides valuable information about a file or document, such as the creator of the document, date and time the document was created, changes made to the document, the software used to create the document, the person who made the changes, the comments that were added to the document and so on. Metadata also provides critical details about clients and their businesses. Therefore, if documents are shared with the opposing party without first editing these details, it could cause irreparable damage. This is what has made enterprises and organizations a bit apprehensive about the use of metadata for legal disclosure
Types of Metadata
There are different types of metadata – descriptive metadata, structural metadata, administrative metadata, rights management metadata, and preservation metadata. For convenience sake, the various types of metadata are grouped into three main categories:
· System Metadata
System metadata refers to the data automatically generated by the system. Information such as the creator of the document, time and date of creation, time and date of modification, recipient of the document, etc., are all categorized as system metadata. System metadata has great importance in legal discovery and can help greatly in building a strong case. Since it is not created deliberately but is automatically generated by the system, it cannot be manipulated easily.
· Substantive Metadata
Substantive metadata refers to changes made to a document in the form of modifications, edits, comments, etc. These changes are not meant for the opposing parties to see. It is also known as application metadata, as the changes get copied when the document is copied.
· Embedded Metadata
Any data, be it text, numbers, content, hyperlinks, references, or spreadsheet formulas, placed directly or indirectly on a native file but which does not necessarily appear on the output is known as embedded metadata.
Metadata, which did not even exist in the e discovery world until a few years back, has now attained far greater significance in legal discovery. Hence, in the concluding segment of this article, we will learn more about metadata and its role in legal ediscovery.
Processing your request, Please wait....
