International legal holds

A panel of WG6 drafting team members will lead a dialogue with all attendees on the draft Commentary on the topic. A preceding brainstorming group concluded that a standalone publication on international legal holds would help move the law forward in a reasoned and just way by supplementing existing publications, including The Sedona Conference Commentary on Legal Holds (prepared by The Sedona Conference Working Group 1), which only identifies issues surrounding international legal holds; and International Litigation Principles, its appendix on Cross-Border Data Safeguarding Process + Transfer Protocol, and The Sedona Conference Practical In-House Approaches for Cross-Border Discovery & Data Protection, which focus on the entirety of the life cycle of cross-border discovery matters rather than focusing on issues arising solely from the legal hold process. With the draft Commentary, WG6 aims to provide a source of comprehensive guidance for practitioners navigating the conflicting obligations that often arise between international data preservation requirements and data protection rules in the context of cross-border litigation and investigations.