Exactly two years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court quietly enacted a package of changes to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, a set of legal guidelines that govern all levels of courts in the United States.

Among them were changes to rules 26 and 34 through 37, which clarify the issue of e-discovery of critical evidence.

These amendments, adopted by the court in April 2006 and placed into effect on Dec. 1, 2006, say businesses must be able to quickly find and make available relevant data when required by a court—federal or otherwise. Often, business information that could also serve as evidence in a criminal or civil lawsuit is required to be made available in as few as 30 days.

That means that every electronic document stored by businesses—e-mail, instant messages, computer logs, financials, voice mail, and all text and graphical documents—must be easily retrievable. It also means that an enterprise must have in place a standard, repeatable, predictable method of storing and accessing its digital data—including established rules about who has access, how long it is kept and where it is maintained.

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