* E-discovery also includes voice messages
We all know that e-mail is discoverable in court proceedings, that regulators can demand e-mail during audits or other inquiries, and that internal requestors – such as HR or in-house legal counsel – will periodically request copies of e-mail for a variety of purposes. In a unified communications system in which voicemail is delivered to an inbox, voice messages are also a message, technically identical to an e-mail in many respects.
For an organization that uses a unified communications system, what happens if a judge orders that voice content must be examined as part of a discovery order, or if a regulator asks for relevant voice messages? As a messaging manager, how would you go about searching through potentially tens of thousands of voice messages stored on unified communication servers or in more traditional voicemail systems?
That’s not an academic question anymore. The new amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (also known as e-discovery) require ‘Electronically Stored Information’ to be part of the discovery process earlier in legal actions – digital bits that store voice are legally no different than digital bits that store e-mails or instant messages. Plus, voicemail has been used for many years in court cases and its value as evidence is without question.
Autonomy’s Intelligent Data Operating Layer (IDOL) technology, used in the company’s etalk Qfiniti Explore offering, can be used to index voice content and make it searchable for a variety of applications, including e-discovery and regulatory compliance. Explore can also be used for a variety of other applications, including monitoring of voice messages to look for inappropriate statements and the like. Autonomy recently acquired Zantaz, a leading provider of hosted and on-premise messaging archiving solutions.
The bottom line is that organizations that are planning to deploy unified communications systems, as well as those that use voicemail – namely, everyone – should consider the ramifications of voice in their e-discovery and other data retention planning.
