By IT-Lex Intern Shannon Allen (LinkedIn)

Our favorite tech giants continue to battle each other in the courtroom.  The District Court for Northern California issued an order on May 9th in response to a Motion to Compel where Apple sued Samsung and subpoenaed third party, Google, for e-discovery.  During the e-discovery meet and confer between Apple and Google, search terms and custodians were not agreed upon or even discussed.  So, Google produced e-discovery.  During a subsequent meet and confer, Apple requested Google provide search terms and custodians used in producing the e-discovery.  Apple wanted to know “how Google created the universe from which it produced documents.” » Read the rest of this entry «

By Pooja S. Nair (bio)

The Singaporean government has adopted aggressive measures to become a regional center for dispute resolution and arbitration in areas ranging from intellectual property, to oil and gas arbitration.

Singaporean court officials have made eDiscovery part of their broader plan to drive dispute resolution and arbitration to the country.  In August 2011, Singapore hosted an International Conference on Electronic Litigation, during which then-Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Chan Sek Keong, stated:

“For Singapore to maintain its lead as a regional dispute resolution centre – whether for litigation or arbitration – our profession must be personally equipped with both the technical tools and the skill set to be able to handle cross-border disputes involving large volumes of documents and in a cost-efficient manner.”

» Read the rest of this entry «

By IT-Lex Intern Karina Saranovic (LinkedIn)

IT-Lex has regularly reported on the issue of social media discovery, and a recent case has led to a Court’s examination of these evidentiary boundaries yet again. When Polly Potts asserted claims against her former employer Dollar Tree Stores, for harassment and discrimination based on race, hostile work environment and retaliation, Dollar Tree Stores responded by making quite a few discovery requests, including asking for access to her “Facebook and/or other social media data”. Not surprisingly, Potts objected, and a district court in Tennessee recently made its decision.

» Read the rest of this entry «

By IT-Lex Intern Joey Chindamo (LinkedIn)

Social media use is widespread, and teenagers are major users. This study indicates that 83 percent of 13- to 17-year-olds have visited a social networking site and 75 percent have their own social media profiles. Anyone who uses social media networks like Facebook or Twitter knows that posts on either site can consist of the newsworthy to the mundane.

All of which makes a recent Illinois appellate court order all the more curious. The court took up a family law appeal earlier this month in which the father argued that the parenting plan and custody for his twins should be modified. The order, R.M. v. D.Z., explained that R.M., the mother, had custody of the twin children. The father, D.Z., sought a modification in the parenting plan and custody because he alleged that K.M., R.M.’s 17-year-old daughter, threatened the twins, consumed alcohol with her mother, and abused illicit drugs. D.Z. tried to use the daughter’s posts on Twitter to prove the allegations.

» Read the rest of this entry «

By IT-Lex Intern Joey Chindamo (LinkedIn)

Do you delete pesky old text messages, hoping to clear up space on your smartphone? Well, think again, especially if you’re in active litigation. In the January decision Christou v. Beatport, LLC, Judge R. Brooke Jackson of the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado sanctioned the defendants for not preserving text messages.

» Read the rest of this entry «

By Joanne Lee (bio)

The day when robots start doing legal work might come sooner than you think.  Indeed, courts and litigants across the country appear to have a laserbeam focus on the newest entrant to the E-Discovery scene: computer assisted review.

» Read the rest of this entry «

By IT-Lex Intern Joey Chindamo (LinkedIn)

A fascinating eDiscovery case out of Maryland federal court last month could be a game-changer in the area of electronically stored information (ESI).

The United States District Court for the District of Maryland released its opinion in Branhaven, LLC v. Beeftek, Inc. [PDF] on January 4. The court imposed sanctions against the Plaintiff, Branhaven, and also imposed sanctions on Plaintiff’s counsel, for discovery violations on multiple grounds after defense counsel complained about “discovery abuses intended to harass defendants, cause unnecessary delay, and needlessly increase the cost of litigation[.]”

» Read the rest of this entry «

In Peerless Indus., Inc. v. Crimson AV, LLC (N.D. Ill. Jan. 8, 2013), another court made it clear that a law firm or litigant can’t just rely on an outside vendor to handle the process associated with eDiscovery preservation, collection, search, and review- and it is not okay to “take a back seat approach and instead let the process proceed through a vendor.”  Particularly when the best answer a deponent can give regarding what efforts were undertaken is that they were handled “I guess by the vendor . . . .”  As you can guess, this is a sanctions case.

» Read the rest of this entry «

By Brian J. Kapatkin (bio)

Any attorney who has reviewed documents collected from a client could tell you that email is often the primary way in which people communicate matters of importance. 

» Read the rest of this entry «

By IT-Lex Intern Shannon Allen (Linkedin)

Earlier this month, the New York Law Journal discussed a proposed expansion to New York’s commercial e-discovery rule, which currently requires parties to “consult with each other at the beginning of a case about the eDiscovery issues they anticipate.” That’s a little wishy-washy, and could do with some more specificity, so let’s see what’s being suggested.

» Read the rest of this entry «