I was going through some old email today and I came across an email discussion with a colleague on journaling in Exchange 2007. As a result of that discussion I was able to clear up some confusion on what type of journaling is included with Exchange 2007 according to the way you have it licensed.
As you may or may not know journaling in Exchange is the ability to record all communications that take place within Exchange. Archiving vendors use journaling as a means to capture all communication from an Exchange server and store it in an Archive. If Envelope Journaling is enabled it also allows archive vendors to capture the transport envelope which includes the P1 message headers which include information about BCC and distribution group recipients.
In Exchange 2003 Journaling is enabled for each mail store. You could enable message-only journaling, BCC journaling, or the aforementioned Envelope journaling. Having journaling at the store level is slightly limiting in that you must apply it to all users for that store. What if you only wanted to journal a few select mailboxes that needed special attention? This brings me to Exchange 2007.
Exchange 2007 has two flavors of journaling, standard and premium. Standard journaling, otherwise known as per-mailbox database journaling, allows you to enable journaling for all users in a specific mailbox database. Premium journaling, otherwise known as per-recipient journaling, allows you to enable journaling for individual mailbox recipients. Since journaling is located on the hub transport I have much more flexibility in Exchange 2007 for journaling. So where is the confusion?
What my friend was confused about is that premium journaling is only available if you have an Exchange Enterprise CAL license. No worries though. While you might envy those super Exchange administrators out there fortunate enough to have an enterprise CAL, standard journaling works just as well. You are not losing functionality but only losing flexibility.
For more on journaling you can visit the Exchange Server TechCenter on Micrsoft’s website. I read through it and if I can understand it anyone can. :)
Here’s the link: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb124382(EXCHG.80).aspx
Technorati Tags:
Email Archiving, Exchange Journaling, Journal, email, Exchange 2007, Exchange 2003, Envelope Journaling
Monday, June 30, 2008
Sunday, June 29, 2008
I’m a SWAGaholic… (LegalTech Day 2)
On the Friday of LegalTech I was able to spend some time walking through the vendor displays in the trade show. I was disappointed to see from my trade show book that there was no category for Archiving. I think archiving is a critical factor to success for eDiscovery (see previous post) so not having a category for it was surprising. By my count there were 4 companies there that had major focus on email archiving. Most were focused on the eDiscovery process or at least a part of the eDiscovery process. This isn’t surprising since it is a show for legal professionals.
I had a conversation with a person at the eCopy booth that was worth mentioning. They make software that sits on top of a Canon network copier/scanner. The software allows users to scan physical documents into electronic documents and helps to automate the process when you are working with a large number of documents. Some of the features they offer are:
Bates Numbering – Assigns each document a unique number as it is scanned into electronic format.
OCR – Recognizes scanned text so that it can be indexed or categorized.
Annotations – Allows you to make notes on the electronic document as well as redact any text that should not be seen.
I know that document scanning solutions have been around for a while but what impressed me about eCopy was the high number of connectors they offered in their solution. They have the capability to integrate with email applications, document management solutions, and hr systems just to name a few. The salesperson I was speaking two also mentioned the possibility of archiving being a need.
There are still some companies out there that have yet to convert the majority of business that they used to do on paper over to digital. They might be storing data in a physical archive that involves paper document storage. Imagine the amount of storage space saved in going from a physical archive to a digital archive. Not to mention the information is now indexed and can easily be searched for later recall. I would think that in order to ensure that you are protected and can recall data quickly you would want to move to a digital archive as quickly as possible.
After making it around the show floor I spent some time at our booth. I was surprised over two days at how many people asked me what eDiscovery was. I guess I never thought that some legal professionals still might be new to this industry. So for those of you that are new to eDiscovery let me lend you a hand. The simplest definition that the EDRM website provides is this:
The process of finding, identifying, locating, retrieving, and reviewing potentially relevant data in designated computer systems.
Oh and by the way. EDRM stands for the “Electronic Discovery Reference Model” and they (the group is made up of over 70 participating companies) spend the majority of their time setting standards and guidelines for the eDiscovery industry. It is a great place to get started. Here’s the link: http://www.edrm.net/
Last but not least… One of my favorite things to do at trade shows is get some SWAG (It’s for the kids, honest). As I walked by the booths I collected anything that looked like it might keep me (I mean the kids) entertained. The winner this show (or the item that kept the kids entertained best) was what I can only describe as a wall crawler. Remember the sticky rubber animals that you can throw against the walls and they would slowly crawl down? The kids loved these and immediately started throwing them all over the house. Apparently when I was a kid I never realized that they leave marks on the walls and windows. Now I do…
Technorati Tags:
LegalTech, Email, Archiving, eDiscovery, EDRM, Imaging, Scanning, OCR, Bates Numbering, SWAG
I had a conversation with a person at the eCopy booth that was worth mentioning. They make software that sits on top of a Canon network copier/scanner. The software allows users to scan physical documents into electronic documents and helps to automate the process when you are working with a large number of documents. Some of the features they offer are:
Bates Numbering – Assigns each document a unique number as it is scanned into electronic format.
OCR – Recognizes scanned text so that it can be indexed or categorized.
Annotations – Allows you to make notes on the electronic document as well as redact any text that should not be seen.
I know that document scanning solutions have been around for a while but what impressed me about eCopy was the high number of connectors they offered in their solution. They have the capability to integrate with email applications, document management solutions, and hr systems just to name a few. The salesperson I was speaking two also mentioned the possibility of archiving being a need.
There are still some companies out there that have yet to convert the majority of business that they used to do on paper over to digital. They might be storing data in a physical archive that involves paper document storage. Imagine the amount of storage space saved in going from a physical archive to a digital archive. Not to mention the information is now indexed and can easily be searched for later recall. I would think that in order to ensure that you are protected and can recall data quickly you would want to move to a digital archive as quickly as possible.
After making it around the show floor I spent some time at our booth. I was surprised over two days at how many people asked me what eDiscovery was. I guess I never thought that some legal professionals still might be new to this industry. So for those of you that are new to eDiscovery let me lend you a hand. The simplest definition that the EDRM website provides is this:
The process of finding, identifying, locating, retrieving, and reviewing potentially relevant data in designated computer systems.
Oh and by the way. EDRM stands for the “Electronic Discovery Reference Model” and they (the group is made up of over 70 participating companies) spend the majority of their time setting standards and guidelines for the eDiscovery industry. It is a great place to get started. Here’s the link: http://www.edrm.net/
Last but not least… One of my favorite things to do at trade shows is get some SWAG (It’s for the kids, honest). As I walked by the booths I collected anything that looked like it might keep me (I mean the kids) entertained. The winner this show (or the item that kept the kids entertained best) was what I can only describe as a wall crawler. Remember the sticky rubber animals that you can throw against the walls and they would slowly crawl down? The kids loved these and immediately started throwing them all over the house. Apparently when I was a kid I never realized that they leave marks on the walls and windows. Now I do…
Technorati Tags:
LegalTech, Email, Archiving, eDiscovery, EDRM, Imaging, Scanning, OCR, Bates Numbering, SWAG
Friday, June 27, 2008
A Vespa? Really? (LegalTech Day 1)
Today and tomorrow I am at LegalTech. LegalTech is show for legal professionals and IT workers covering such subjects as eDiscovery, archiving, and other technology issues of interest to legal professionals. I wanted to relay two things to you from the show today.
The first comes from the sessions I attended today. The first session I attended today was delivered by Bill Tolsen from Mimosa Systems. The main theme I gained from his presentation was how important proactive eDiscovery was. He stated that he thought the market was headed in that direction.
I also attended a presentation given by Keri Farrell from Quest Software (Full Disclosure: Keri and I work together at Quest). A portion of Keri’s presentation talked about the differences between Proactive and Reactive eDiscovery. I thought she did an excellent job explaining it and thought the definitions she used were easy to understand. For those that do not know here is what we mean when we talk about proactive and reactive eDiscovery.
From her presentation she says Reactive eDiscovery is a company saying “We don’t know what’s out there, or where it all is, but need to produce evidence for x
She says that Proactive eDiscovery is a company saying “We need to set up our Exchange environment in order to facilitate discovery” or “I’m going to put my keys in the right place so I can find them easily!”
Proactive eDiscovery involves Archiving. You can’t be proactive without it. You will not know where you your keys are if you do not have a place to keep them. Having everything (that needs to be saved) contained in a single repository in an Archive allows you to store data in a location where it can be easily found. There are also some other advantages I thought about with the proactive approach. They are:
* You can do journaling to capture envelope information where as reactive eDiscovery does not involve journaling
* Indexing is done as you store data making the search for data faster since there is no need for the index to be built first.
* Retention policies can be managed better if everything is centrally stored.
* Centralize and therefore control .pst files in the archive instead of at the desktop.
* Legal hold is easier to apply to a centralized repository.
Those are just a few advantages but I am sure there are more. The point is that in order to successfully remain compliant a proactive approach is best. There is a place for the reactive approach but in order to minimize your risk you should be proactive.
That brings me to the second Item. I learned something today. If you want to attract people to your booth at a tradeshow a Vespa is actually better than an Xbox. :)
Technorati Tags:
Email Archiving, Compliance, Proactive eDiscovery, Vespa, LegalTech
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Can your company read your email?
Below is a link to an interesting article in the Los Angeles Times this week. It has to do with a ruling by the 9th Circuit Court of appeals on an employer’s ability to access and read electronic messages (text messages or email) when they are stored with an outside provider. There are several interesting things to note about this ruling.
Arch Wireless was defined in the ruling as being an “electronic communication service” (ECS). This is important because if they were defined as a “remote computing service” (RCS) then they would be off the hook. The Stored Communications Act allows an RCS to release stored private electronic communication with consent of either the user or the subscriber (the city in this case) whereas if they are an ECS they can only release private communication with consent of the addressee or recipient.
At this point all of you who are using a hosted email or hosted archiving solution are wondering if your service is considered an RCS or ECS. As luck would have it the court made the distinction between what defines an RCS and an ECS. An ECS provides users with the ability to send or receive electronic communication. An ECS might also store those electronic communications but only temporarily for the purpose of transmission of the content or backup protection. On the other hand an RCS is defined as the provisioning of public computer storage or processing by means of an electronic communications systems.
Arch Wireless was defined as an ECS because when it archived the text messages it was not clear who it was doing that for. If they were clearly providing a storage service for their provider then they would have been classified as an RCS.
It is clear to me from this ruling that corporations using a third party for email service (e.g. MSN Hotmail) would need consent from the addressee or recipient in order to search or look at the email stored in that service. It is not clear to me whether or not this might extend to hosting companies hosting an email system (e.g. Corporate Exchange) for the public. In those cases they might be looked on as provisioning storage space so that they can host the Exchange organization.
However it is very clear to me that the way to avoid the risk associated with this ruling is to Archive. Whether hosted or onsite an Archive is not the storage of email for the purposes of back protection or a temporary holding position for transmission. An Archive is providing a permanent copy of the email for the purposes of compliance or eDiscovery. If a company uses a hosted solution for archiving they are safe since that solution clearly is provisioning storage to the public and storing data permanently. Safer yet is the company that Archives all data and stores it in house. This ruling would not apply to them.
Listed below are links to the article and the ruling. Enjoy! :)
http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-me-text19-2008jun19,0,1023202.story
http://www.ca9.uscourts.gov/ca9/newopinions.nsf/D2CDDB4098D7AFB28825746C0048ED24/$file/0755282.pdf?openelement
Technorati Tags:
Email Archiving, Hosting, Exchange Server, Compliance, Storage, Arch Wireless Case, Email Hosting, Hotmail, eDiscovery
Arch Wireless was defined in the ruling as being an “electronic communication service” (ECS). This is important because if they were defined as a “remote computing service” (RCS) then they would be off the hook. The Stored Communications Act allows an RCS to release stored private electronic communication with consent of either the user or the subscriber (the city in this case) whereas if they are an ECS they can only release private communication with consent of the addressee or recipient.
At this point all of you who are using a hosted email or hosted archiving solution are wondering if your service is considered an RCS or ECS. As luck would have it the court made the distinction between what defines an RCS and an ECS. An ECS provides users with the ability to send or receive electronic communication. An ECS might also store those electronic communications but only temporarily for the purpose of transmission of the content or backup protection. On the other hand an RCS is defined as the provisioning of public computer storage or processing by means of an electronic communications systems.
Arch Wireless was defined as an ECS because when it archived the text messages it was not clear who it was doing that for. If they were clearly providing a storage service for their provider then they would have been classified as an RCS.
It is clear to me from this ruling that corporations using a third party for email service (e.g. MSN Hotmail) would need consent from the addressee or recipient in order to search or look at the email stored in that service. It is not clear to me whether or not this might extend to hosting companies hosting an email system (e.g. Corporate Exchange) for the public. In those cases they might be looked on as provisioning storage space so that they can host the Exchange organization.
However it is very clear to me that the way to avoid the risk associated with this ruling is to Archive. Whether hosted or onsite an Archive is not the storage of email for the purposes of back protection or a temporary holding position for transmission. An Archive is providing a permanent copy of the email for the purposes of compliance or eDiscovery. If a company uses a hosted solution for archiving they are safe since that solution clearly is provisioning storage to the public and storing data permanently. Safer yet is the company that Archives all data and stores it in house. This ruling would not apply to them.
Listed below are links to the article and the ruling. Enjoy! :)
http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-me-text19-2008jun19,0,1023202.story
http://www.ca9.uscourts.gov/ca9/newopinions.nsf/D2CDDB4098D7AFB28825746C0048ED24/$file/0755282.pdf?openelement
Technorati Tags:
Email Archiving, Hosting, Exchange Server, Compliance, Storage, Arch Wireless Case, Email Hosting, Hotmail, eDiscovery
Monday, June 23, 2008
How do I start this thing?
This officially marks my entry into the world of blogging. As you will be able to tell from this first post I am a newbie. I have been holding back on this for a long time now and am finally pulling the trigger. My hope is that this will be an informative site where you will find useful information. I guess you might be asking yourself at this point what this blog might be about....
That's WHAC will be about What's Happening with Archiving and Compliance. Basically I will be covering any interesting information in the world of Archiving and issues facing the IT industry as it struggles with regulatory compliance. It took me a while to find a name but I am happy with what I settled on. I thought it might be best to use language popular with "the kids" today so I could better relate to the "young people". (This all comes from the fact that my 6 year old son thinks I am old and told me so in no uncertain terms).
I am starting this blog for a few different reasons. First the archiving market is huge. There are too many Archiving vendors in the market to count and each does things slightly different. I hope I can bring clarity to some of the confusion.
Second, it seems to me that IT's challenge of meeting regulatory compliance is constantly evolving. I seem to learn something new in this area everyday. As I find new things I will post so that you might be informed as well.
Third, my boss is making me :). Actually it was suggested by many but this has been on my mind for a while now.
Well there it is, my first post. If you have gotten this far then I haven't scared you off yet. I hope that this will be both fun and informative. Feel free to leave any comments. I will look forward to hearing from those who find this blog useful. Talk to you soon!
That's WHAC will be about What's Happening with Archiving and Compliance. Basically I will be covering any interesting information in the world of Archiving and issues facing the IT industry as it struggles with regulatory compliance. It took me a while to find a name but I am happy with what I settled on. I thought it might be best to use language popular with "the kids" today so I could better relate to the "young people". (This all comes from the fact that my 6 year old son thinks I am old and told me so in no uncertain terms).
I am starting this blog for a few different reasons. First the archiving market is huge. There are too many Archiving vendors in the market to count and each does things slightly different. I hope I can bring clarity to some of the confusion.
Second, it seems to me that IT's challenge of meeting regulatory compliance is constantly evolving. I seem to learn something new in this area everyday. As I find new things I will post so that you might be informed as well.
Third, my boss is making me :). Actually it was suggested by many but this has been on my mind for a while now.
Well there it is, my first post. If you have gotten this far then I haven't scared you off yet. I hope that this will be both fun and informative. Feel free to leave any comments. I will look forward to hearing from those who find this blog useful. Talk to you soon!
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