Gibson Dunn & Crutcher has just released its 2016 mid-year electronic discovery update as e-discovery software provider Zapproved publishes a useful 12-step processing and early case assessment ‘how to’ guide and Catalyst launches an integrated managed review service.
Gibson Dunn’s overview identifies trends, issues and developments for the first half of 2016. It points to an overall improvement in the e-discovery landscape and the positive impact of the amended and improved Federal Rule 37(e), which imposes sanctions for failure to preserve discoverable electronically stored information.
The report says that recent advances in e-discovery and database software such as SaaS-based e-discovery solutions are making it more feasible for law firms and clients to handle e-discovery tasks without the involvement of a traditional e-discovery services providers in all but the largest matters.
Additionally, advances in database technology promise to significantly reduce the costs – and dramatically increase the speeds – of data ingestion, processing and search, which will become particularly important as e-discovery grapples with “big data.”
However, there are challenges and the report finds: “New sources of potentially discoverable ESI, such as text messaging and social media, have created new risks and difficulties for identification, legal hold preservation and collection. Indeed, many of the sanctions decisions to date in 2016 have involved failures to preserve text messages on mobile devices.”
It adds: “The potential of predictive coding to greatly reduce costs and increase accuracy and review speeds remains largely unfulfilled, hampered by a number of factors – including a lack of awareness of the technology, lawyers’ comfort with traditional keyword searches, obstacles raised by those opposing its use (such as demanding access to irrelevant documents in training sets), and the limited availability of the latest predictive coding software.”
You can access the full report here: http://www.gibsondunn.com/publications/Pages/2016-Mid-Year-E-Discovery-Update.aspx
Zapproved’s 12 processing and ECA ‘how tos’ provides a useful guide to optimising the keys steps in your ECA and data processing workflow.
Headline topics including establishing a budget for e-discovery; finding the ‘smoking gun’ (by using concept searches instead of just key words); how to find secret custodians; how to eliminate exact duplicates in data collection; and how to ensure the consistent treatment of similar documents.
You can access the report here (we would paste the direct link but it’s 305 characters long.)
Catalyst, meanwhile, has this week launched Catalyst Managed Review, which combines managed review and review tech under one roof.
Under the new package clients get Catalyst’s search, analytics and review platform, Catalyst Insight, backed by experienced review managers and Insight-trained reviewers.
A key feature of the new offering is Active Review. Integrated into Catalyst Insight is the technology assisted review engine, Insight Predict, with its unique Continuous Active Learning protocol. With Active Review, the system continuously learns from reviewers’ judgments and actively selects the best documents to move the review forward. Review and TAR work hand-in-hand, speeding the review and lowering costs.
“Now our clients can work with one vendor to streamline workflow and assure quality,” said John Tredennick, Catalyst’s founder and CEO. “Our review managers are experts not only in review, but also in using our award-winning platform. With its advanced algorithms, Predict enables us to deliver the world’s only Active Review process for getting to the right documents more quickly.”
Leading Catalyst’s managed review team is Adam Tondryk, who came to Catalyst after serving as director of managed review at Managed Discovery and as project director at both Advanced Discovery and Axiom.