Question 1

What makes an e Disclosure strategy "defensible"?

Accepted Answer

Three properties. Connection: every scope and method decision traces to the pleaded issues through the matrix, the tiering and the protocol. Evidence: decisions rest on measured numbers and tested terms, not instinct. Records: the strategy generates its documents as it executes (hold register, data map, control schedule, assessment report, search protocol, logs), so any later challenge is answered by production, not reconstruction. A strategy with those properties can be wrong in places and still defensible; a strategy without them can be right every where and still in defensible. How early is early? The dispute has only just surfaced. Step 2 is due the day proceedings are contemplated, which is usually before anyone calls it litigation. Steps 1 and 3 to 6 belong in the first fortnight even pre-action: preservation duties are live, pre-action protocols reward preparedness, and pre-action assessment (Step 7) improves pleading and settlement judgment. Nothing in the workflow waits for issue of proceedings; the CMC merely collects its outputs.

Question 2

Our client already collected data themselves. Is the strategy compromised?

Accepted Answer

Damaged, not doomed. Record exactly what was done, by whom, when and with what tools; stop further self- help immediately; assess with the provider what the in form a l collection preserved and destroyed; re-collect defensibly where sources still allow it; and route anything trigger-positive to forensic assessment of the handling itself. Candour in the DRD about the early handling, with the remediation documented, is a survivable position; discovery of it by the opponent is not.

Question 3

Does a small case need all ten steps?

Accepted Answer

It needs all ten questions answered; the answers are just shorter. A two-custodian employment dispute can run Step 2 in an after no on, Steps 3 to 6 in two meetings, Step 7 at level 1 only, and Steps 8 to 10 in a five-page protocol. What small cases cannot safely skip is the same as large ones: day-one preservation, reasoned scope, tested terms and a written record.

Question 4

What happens to the strategy when the case changes?

Accepted Answer

It versions. Amended pleadings re-run Step 1's matrix; new custodians re-run Steps 4 to 6 for the additions; staged tranches promote on their defined triggers; and each change is dated and reasoned in the document. The living-document commitment belongs in the DRD itself, because promptly proposed, well-recorded changes read as diligence while silent ones read as concealment.

Question 5

Who should build the strategy: the firm, the client or the provider?

Accepted Answer

The firm owns it (the certificate and the court-facing assertions are the lawyers'); the client supplies the facts and a single accountable IT channel; the provider contributes the measurement, the technical constraints and the execution machinery, and a good one will challenge the plan where the estate cannot support it. What fails is delegation of the whole to either of the other two: client-built strategies inherit self-collection risks, and provider- built ones optimise for workflow rather than for the case. cflab. u k · e-disc ove r y. u k ©2026 Computer Forensics Lab Ltd ·cflab.uk ·e-discovery.uk ·info@cflab.uk ·+44 (0)20 7164 6915 Page 24 of 27

How To Build A Defensible EDisclosure Strategy At The Start Of A Case