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ARTICLE · 08 NOVEMBER 2004

Disclosure Obligations And The E-ternal Debate

Barlow Lyde & Gilbert LLP
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With 90% of business communication being through e-mail searching for paper documents to comply with disclosure obligations is no longer a thorough search. What are the future implications - particularly as 70% of electronic communication is never printed.

United KingdomLitigation, Mediation & Arbitration
Emily Brunton
Emily Brunton

There comes a time in every piece of litigation that proceeds to trial, that the dreaded process of disclosure must be approached. In the past, this has always involved trawling the paper files for relevant documents. However, it is now becoming increasingly common to search not only paper documents but electronic files. Statistics have shown that currently well over 90% of all business communication is in electronic format (for example e-mail). It has been estimated that some 70% of this electronic communication is never printed. This means that, searching for paper documents to comply with disclosure obligations is only scraping the tip of the iceberg. Potentially thousands or hundreds of thousands of documents will be lurking on computers, PDA’s or even as text messages in mobile phones. How thorough a search should therefore be made in order to comply with the obligation to make a "reasonable search" for documents?

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