Extract from DISCO’s article “Legal Hold Best Practices: A Process Guide”
Congratulations on taking the first step toward facilitating your legal team’s ability to quickly and effectively respond to legal hold requests while maintaining compliance and defensibility. In this article, you’ll learn litigation hold best practices you can apply to a step-by-step process for an efficient, repeatable legal hold process.
Legal holds 101
What is a legal hold?
A legal hold, or litigation hold, is a formal request issued within an organization to preserve all forms of relevant information in the face of expected or pending litigation. Litigation holds ensure that all relevant documents and data (including, for example, emails, Slack messages, Zoom recordings, collaborative documents, and more) are preserved – and not destroyed – and kept intact for the discovery process.
Why are legal holds important?
Legal holds are extremely important because their primary purpose is to preserve evidence. Additionally, the failure to properly initiate legal holds can result in negative inferences and hefty sanctions.
When is a legal hold initiated?
The need to initiate a legal hold is triggered when possible legal or regulatory action is anticipated – or a demand or letter complaint has been received. Depending on your company’s industry, region and type of business, triggering events can vary.
