On March 4, 2014, I wrote a blog post about the development of an international e-discovery standard (the "Standard"). In a week-long series of meetings in Hong Kong during the week of April 7th, the international standards community made considerable progress in advancing the Standard. In this blog post, I update you on the developments which have taken place and invite you to provide comments on early working drafts as part of Canada's contribution to the Standard.
What is the Status of the International E-Discovery Standard?
In light of the complexity of e-discovery issues, the Standard has been broken up into four parts, with four editors working together to generate the drafts based on comments from the member bodies, as follows:
| Reference | Title | Editor(s) |
| 27050-1 | Electronic Discovery – Part 1: Overview and concepts | Eric Hibbard |
| 27050-2 | Electronic Discovery – Part 2: Guidance
for governance and management of electronic discovery |
Angus Marshall |
| 27050-3 | Electronic Discovery – Part 3: Code of
practice for electronic discovery |
Eric Hibbard Kelly Friedman |
| 27050-4 | Electronic Discovery – Part 4: ICT readiness
for electronic discovery |
Angus Marshall Kate Greenwood |
Each of the four parts are at the working draft stage, with Part 1 about to enter its third working draft, and the remaining Parts about to enter their second working draft. Each of the Parts will remain as a working draft unless and until the working group is satisfied that the best technical and practical solutions are being proposed. If and when the working group is satisfied that a sufficient level of progress has been made, the Part will becoming a "committee draft" which is registered by the ISO Central Secretariat, and distributed for comment and, if required, voting.
At the working draft stage, each member body (country participating in the international standards development process) is encouraged to build-consensus in the member country.
One of my important roles as co-editor of Part 3: Code of practice for electronic discovery and as a member of the working group developing each of the remaining Parts, is to reach out to interested stakeholders in Canada for input.
How Can You Contribute to the Development of the International E-Discovery Standard?
If you or the company or organization to which you are affiliated wishes to contribute to Canada's comments, I will be permitted to provide you with copies of each of the next working drafts (or the Part or Parts which interest you), to be issued in July. In accordance with ISO/IEC procedure, comments are only considered if they are presented in a particular format. If the procedure is complied with, I can then compile all of the comments from Canadian stakeholders and file them with the ISO/IEC as "Canada's comments." In this way, Canada's comments will be formally considered at the next series of international meetings in Mexico in October 2014.
At this time, I am reaching out to determine the level of interest of Canadian stakeholders to contribute to the generation of the Canadian comments to be discussed in October 2014. Depending on the level of interest, I will either speak with stakeholders one-on-one, or hold one or more information sessions to provide an overview of the process, answer questions, and explain the manner in which comments must be submitted.
The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances.
