Transcript E-Mail Retention Primer

E-mail Retention:
Preserving Public Records
John L. Baines
OIT Security and Compliance
Agenda
 Public Records E-mail Background
 Unit Public Record Retention Management Practices
 Non-Records Material
 Save or Delete? -What Constitutes a Public Record?
 E-mail Evidence in Courts
 E-mail Custodian
 Help for Custodian
 The OIT Archival Repository of E-mail
 Personal E-mail Accounts
 Handling E-mail
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E-mail Retention Overview
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Public Records (PR) E-mail Background
 North Carolina Public Records Act, N.C.G.S. 132-1
 Public Records:
 Are the property of the people of North Carolina
 Must be presented upon their request
 May not be deleted or otherwise altered or disposed of except in
accordance with the University General Records Retention and
Disposition Schedule and optional Unit Specific Addenda
 It is everyone’s responsibility to keep all work-related
electronic records (including e-mail)
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E-mail Retention Primer
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Unit PR Retention Mgt. Practices
 Much broader than just e-mail
 Includes electronic records stored on disk as well as e-mail.
 Generally, university units are responsible for:
 Establishing appropriate record retention management practices
 Appointing a records manager who ensures that:
 Unit public records are retained and disposed of in accordance with
the University General Record Schedule and Unit Specific Addenda
 Access to confidential university records and information is restricted
 Records with historical value are delivered to the University Archivist
 Accurate records of destruction or transfer activity are maintained
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E-mail Retention Primer
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Non-Records Material
 Personal records
 Limited family or personal
communications allowed so long
as no interference with work
 No privacy guarantee
 Delete to protect privacy
at user discretion
 Spam - electronic junk mail
 Unsolicited e-mails
 Unwanted, but somewhat
business related
 Miscellaneous newsletters
 Non-work related
announcements
 Legitimate advertisements
 Etc.
 Delete in a timely manner
 Unsolicited and unwanted
 Filter or delete immediately
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Retention of Public Records (PR)
 Short-term records are temporary in nature. Examples
include communications received from professional listservers and broad announcements received by all employees.
Can be deleted when no longer useful.
 Long-term records have significant value to the agency
but do not need to be maintained permanently. They are the
focus of this presentation.
 Permanent records are records that have lasting historical
value because they document or constitute evidence of state
policies, decisions, procedures, and essential transactions.
Physically transmitted to and held by the University archivist.
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Save or Delete?

FILE IT
TOSS IT
 Issues policy
 Reservations for travel
 States decisions
 Confirms appointments
 Outlines procedures
 Gives guidance
 Shows action
 Processes transaction
 Is unique
 If in doubt…
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
E-mail Retention Primer
 Transmits other documents
without comment
 Personal messages
 Spam
 Unsolicited messages
 Etc.
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E-mail Evidence in Courts
 E-mail has become the primary business communication medium
for most organizations:
 Inside an organization or between organizations
 E-mail establishes the time and date of a written communication
between an originator and one or more recipients
 Often documents are attached to e-mail which provides the
document version that was transmitted at a specific date and time
 E-mail informal writing style
 More informal than most other written communications
 Can lead to inadvertent or unguarded exposure of information
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E-mail Custodian
 Custodian must be able to present all work-related e-mail
of a non-transient nature:
 Those you create (to recipients inside or outside university)
 Those you receive from external sources (outside the university)
 Individual “custodian” is responsible for presenting records
in response to legitimate requests:
 Public records requests (e.g. press, media or individual citizens)
 University litigation discovery requests
(preparatory to court cases)
 Subpoenas (e.g. court evidence)
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Help for Custodian
 Custodian is responsible for e-mail retention and
presentation, BUT must not go it alone!
 Coordinate all requests through Office of Legal
Affairs (OLA)
 Establish legitimacy of request
 Legal aspects
 Privacy aspects
 Office of Information Technology (OIT) to assist in
accessing e-mail archive
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The OIT Archival Repository of E-mail
 Automatic for university (OIT-provided) e-mail systems:
 GroupWise
 Potentially university GoogleApps
 Characteristics:
 Copied as e-mails are:
 Created internally within the university
 Received by the university from external originators
 Unalterable
 Searchable by name, content, date, etc.
 E-mails retained for maximum PR retention period
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Personal E-mail Accounts
 E.g.Yahoo, Road Runner, MSN, AOL, etc.
 Not supported by the University
 E-mail to/from personal e-mail addresses is not
automatically archived by the university
 E-mail stored on personal e-mail accounts not available
to the university for records requests
 All university-business e-mail messages must be
stored in the University archival repository
 E.g. Custodian forwards to the university e-mail system
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Handling E-mail
 Everyday business purposes
 Save as you see fit
 Retrieve from disk copy or e-mail on-line folders
 Delete as you see fit
 E-mail archive – Authoritative source of PR e-mail
 OLA will establish legitimacy of request
 OIT will provide access for individual custodians to their own e-mails
in the archive and facilitate the process
 Normally, custodian will recover e-mails
 Unit will recover if custodian unavailable or un-cooperative
 OLA will handle privacy aspects and present e-mails for specific request
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References
 Department of Cultural Resources, State Archives
(State Government Authority)
 http://www.records.ncdcr.gov/erecords/Email_Policy.pdf
 University General Records Retention and Disposition
Schedule
 http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/universityarchives/retentionschedules/UNCGenSch14062007OCR.pdf
 Two regulations in process of review and update:
 Public Records Regulation
 Proposed Revision to REG01.25.12 - University Record Retention & Disposition Regulation
 E-mail Retention Regulation
 Proposed Revision to REG08.00.9 - University E-mail Retention
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Questions?