EnCase Search Technology Validated by Federal Court in Contested Electronic Discovery Ruling
Guidance Software, Inc.PASADENA, Calif., Mar. 23, 2009 – Guidance Software Inc. (NASDAQ:GUID), the World Leader in Digital Investigations™, today issued a legal alert addressing a recent published court ruling furthering the already strong legal standing of its EnCase® software. In this instance, the case addressed EnCase’s native search engine used to identify, search and collect electronically stored information (ESI). The court, after considering extensive evidence from both sides of the dispute, accepted key findings based upon the detailed search analysis performed with EnCase.
In Smith v. Slifer Smith & Frampton/Vail Associates Real Estate[1], a United States District Court issued a definitive ruling finding that a party to a civil litigation matter improperly wiped his hard drives in the face of impending electronic discovery production request. According to the court, EnCase was used by the plaintiff to search the defendant’s laptops for relevant ESI. The EnCase search protocol cited by the court can employ complex keywords as well as other search expressions to identify data patterns such as social security numbers, credit card numbers, intellectual property, or — as in this case — evidence of data wiping activity.
The court expressly found that the evidence supported the validity of the results obtained by EnCase. While many prior courts have validated the collection, preservation and authentication capabilities of EnCase, this decision validates the EnCase search engine employed for analysis in a civil court eDiscovery matter.
"The ruling by the Smith court is further validation of EnCase as the leading software for eDiscovery," said Victor Limongelli, President and CEO of Guidance Software. "eDiscovery best practices are defined by the courts, and published case law such as this decision is important legal authority that guides corporate counsel, law firms and eDiscovery practitioners as they seek to employ proven and defensible processes."
EnCase® technology has been validated by court decisions for more than ten years and serves as the platform for EnCase® eDiscovery. EnCase eDiscovery is the leading eDiscovery software for the search, identification, collection, preservation and processing of ESI. It performs automated search, collection, and preservation of ESI residing in unstructured and semi-structured data stores such as: desktops, laptops, file servers, email servers, content management systems, and removable storage media, all without any business disruption and maintaining the integrity of the collected data — including file metadata — with a court-validated chain of custody. Additionally, extensive processing capabilities enable post-collection culling and de-duplication of data, as well as load file creation for the most popular attorney review platforms, allowing customers to drastically reduce processing costs.
Guidance Software received the highest ranking (Top 5 Provider) in the eDiscovery Software Providers Category of Socha-Gelbmann's 2008 Electronic Discovery Survey. The company also received two 2008 awards from Law Technology News for EnCase eDiscovery's collection and processing capabilities. More information about Guidance Software case citations can be found in the EnCase Legal Journal, available from www.guidancesoftware.com
About Guidance Software (GUID)
Guidance Software is recognized worldwide as the industry leader in digital investigative solutions. Its EnCase(r) platform provides the foundation for government, corporate and law enforcement organizations to conduct thorough, network-enabled, and court-validated computer investigations of any kind, such as responding to eDiscovery requests, conducting internal investigations, responding to regulatory inquiries or performing data and compliance auditing - all while maintaining the integrity of the data. There are more than 30,000 licensed users of the EnCase technology worldwide, and thousands attend Guidance Software's renowned training programs annually. Validated by numerous courts, corporate legal departments, government agencies and law enforcement organizations worldwide, EnCase has been honored with industry awards and recognition from eWEEK, SC Magazine, Network Computing, and the Socha-Gelbmann survey. For more information about Guidance Software, visit www.guidancesoftware.com.
Electronic Discovery
© 2009 Guidance Software, Inc.
