Why Cloud Why Now: The Future of Ediscovery

Everlaw ESI Protocol Template

DISCLAIMER: EVERLAW IS NOT A LAW FIRM AND DOES NOT PROVIDE LEGAL ADVICE OR ENGAGE IN THE PRACTICE OF LAW.
THIS TEMPLATE DOES NOT CONSTITUTE LEGAL ADVICE. THE INFORMATION CONTAINED HERE IS A LIMITED EXAMPLE ONLY
OF A POTENTIAL ESI PROTOCOL THAT IS APPROPRIATE FOR USE WITH OUR EDISCOVERY PLATFORM. YOU SHOULD NOT ACT
OR RELY ON ANY INFORMATION CONTAINED IN THIS DOCUMENT WITHOUT SEEKING THE ADVICE OF AN ATTORNEY.

[This template is a form document containing technical recommendations only. This template is meant only to be a starting point
for the technical mechanics suitable for making and receiving productions and for the creation and use of the productions in modern
ediscovery platforms.

This template entirely excludes many subjects that parties may want to negotiate as part of their discovery obligations. For example,
there are no sections on scope of preservation, negotiating custodians, requirements for privilege clawback or FRE 502(d), on
confidentiality designations or protective orders, on schedule for exchanges of production, of ongoing requirements for meet-and-
confer, or of quality control mechanisms for search terms or the use of predictive coding or other technology-assisted review. Re-using
identical ESI protocols for unrelated matters is not recommended.

In order to comply with relevant rules and case law and to ensure discovery compliance proportional to the needs of any particular
case, clients and counsel should consult with experienced ediscovery attorneys practicing in the jurisdiction of the court where this
template may be used.]

Introduction
This Stipulation Regarding Production Of Electronically Stored Information And Paper Documents (“ESI
Protocol”) shall govern the parties in the above-captioned case and all actions that are later consolidated
with that case (collectively, the “Litigation”).

1. Definitions and Scope. The following protocol and definitions shall control the production of
discoverable documents and electronically stored information when production commences. The
following terms shall be defined:

a. “Document(s)” means electronically stored information (ESI) existing in any medium from which
information can be obtained or translated into reasonably usable form and shall have the same
meaning as used in the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and case law construing the same.

b. “Native File(s)” or “Native Format” means ESI that has an associated file structure defined by the
creating or viewing application in the file type for (or of) the application in which such ESI is
normally created, viewed, and/or modified.

c. “Metadata” means: (i) information associated with or embedded in a Native File that does not
constitute the primary content region of the file; and (ii) information generated automatically by
the operation of a computer or other information technology system when a Native File is created,
modified, transmitted, deleted, or otherwise manipulated by a user of such system.
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d. “Load File” means an electronic data file containing information identifying documents containing (i)
an indication of which individual pages or files constitute each Document and relevant data relevant
to each individual Document, including extracted metadata.

e. “OCR” means optical character recognition, generating a text from an image of text using software.

f. “Extracted Text” means all text content extracted from a Native File.

g. “Receiving Party” shall mean the party receiving production of Documents in response to any request
for production of document(s) pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P. 34(a) or pursuant to initial production of
documents identified in the party’s Rule 26(a) disclosures.

h. “Producing Party” shall mean the party producing Documents in response to any request for
production of documents pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P. 34(a) or pursuant to initial production of
documents identified in the party’s Rule 26(a) disclosures.

i. “Bates Number” means an identifier consists of a short two to eight letter prefix, associated with the
Producing Party’s name, followed by 6 numbers ( e.g. ABCD000001). The prefix should include only
letters, dashes, or underscores. The prefix and number should not be separated by a space. Each page
in the production is assigned a unique, incremental Bates number. The prefix must be the same for
all pages produced from the same Producing Party.

2. General Format of Production. Documents that are produced in these proceedings, whether originally
stored in paper or electronic form, shall be produced in electronic image form and / or in native
format in the manner as described below. Notwithstanding the foregoing provisions of this paragraph,
the Parties reserve the right to request that an alternative format or method of production be used
for certain Documents, if such Document is not susceptible to production in the format methods of
production addressed herein. In that event, the Receiving Party and the Producing Party will meet and
confer to discuss alternative production requirements, concerns, formats, or methods.

3. Production Format. Documents shall be produced according to the following formats:

a. Electronic Production of Paper Documents. Documents that are maintained in paper format shall be
scanned images at 300 DPI resolution, in text searchable PDF format that represents the full and
complete information contained in the original Document. Paper Documents that contain fixed
notes shall be scanned with the notes affixed, if it can be done so in a manner so as not to obstruct
other content on the document. If the content of the Document is obscured by the affixed notes,
the Document and note shall be scanned separately. Documents shall also be produced with the
associated OCR text, and with a load file. No Producing Party shall be required to ensure that the OCR
is an exact duplicate of the contents of the image.
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b. Electronically Stored Information. Document images shall be generated from electronic Documents
in a set of color 300 DPI text searchable PDFs, one PDF file per document, that reflects the full and
complete information contained on the original document, together with a load file containing
required metadata. In the event a Document is redacted, the Producing Party shall withhold the
redacted text for that Document.

c. File Structure. The Producing Party shall produce the following sets of files for all
produced documents:

Load File:

/ Each production includes a .dat metadata load file, which is a delimited text file format. The
first row of the file contains a list of metadata columns. Each subsequent row contains the
metadata for a single document. Each column of each row contains one metadata value, with
values encapsulated by a special “quote” character and columns separated by a special “separator”
character throughout.

/ The load file should use a thorn (þ, ASCII character 231) as a quote character and the special, non-
printing character DC4 (ASCII character 20) as a separator.

/ First line must contain the column/field names.

/ The fields Begin Bates, End Bates, and NativePath must be present

/ Each subsequent row must contain the metadata for one document

/ Every row must have the same number of columns/fields (empty values are acceptable)

/ Text must be encoded in either ASCII, UTF-8, or UTF-16

/ Load File should be placed in the Data folder of the production in the root directory

Extracted Text and OCR Files (.txt files):

/ A single text file for each document containing all the document’s pages, in text.

/ Pages separated by form feed character (decimal 12, hex 0x0C)

/ Filenames should be of the form: <Bates num>.txt, where <Bates num> is the Bates number of the
first page of the document

/ Text and filenames must be encoded in UTF-8

/ Files should be placed in the text/ subdirectory

Image Files:

/ A single 300 DPI, color, text searchable PDF file per document

/ Filenames should be of the form: <Bates num>.pdf, where <Bates num> is the BATES number of
the first page of the document.

/ Files should be placed in the images/ subdirectory

 Everlaw ESI Protocol Template

/ PDFs shall include searchable text embedded in the document.

/ No other information should be provided in image filenames, including confidentiality status.

/ Filenames must be encoded in UTF-8

Native Files:

/ Filenames must be unique in the production, unless the content is identical. We recommend
naming files by the Bates number of the first page of the associated document

/ The filename must retain the file extension corresponding to the original native format; for
example, an Excel 2003 spreadsheet’s extension must be .xls

/ Each filename, including extension, must correspond to the NativePathmetadata field in its
corresponding document’s row in the load file

/ Filenames must be encoded in UTF-8

/ Files should be placed in the natives/ subdirectory

d. Resolution of Production Issues. Documents that cannot be read because of imaging or formatting
problems shall be promptly identified by the Receiving Party.

The Producing Party and the Receiving Party shall meet and confer to attempt to resolve problem(s),
to the extent the problem(s) are within the Parties’ control.

e. Native Format Documents. Notwithstanding the foregoing provisions of this paragraph, the parties
recognize that it may be appropriate for certain Documents to be produced in Native Format.
Therefore, the Producing Party shall produce [all spreadsheets and audio/video files in native format]
[list other types of files desired in Native Form only] unless there is an agreement to the contrary.]
The Receiving Party may also request that the Producing Party produce additional file types of
electronic Documents in Native Format where the converted image format distorts or causes the
information to be improperly displayed, or for which there is no visual representation.

4. Production Method. Production media shall always be encrypted and will be sent via FTP or SFTP
link provided via email at the time a production letter is emailed, unless the parties agree otherwise.
On the occasion in which a particular production is of a size that would make sending it via FTP link
impractical, the parties may agree to send encrypted physical media such as a Hard Drive or USB.
Production letters will always accompany productions including the name of the matter in which it was
produced, the production date, the Bates number range of the material contained in the production, and
a short description of its contents. Passwords for encrypted media will be sent separately from the
media itself.

5. Document Unitization. When scanning paper documents into Document Images, they shall be
unitized in a manner so as to maintain the document(s) and any attachments, as they existed in their
original state.
 Everlaw ESI Protocol Template

6. Attachment Families.

a. For electronic documents, the relationship of documents in a document collection (e.g., cover
letter and enclosures, e-mail and attachments, binder containing multiple documents, or other
documents where a parent-child relationship exists between the documents) shall be maintained
using the Begin Family and End Family fields of the load file, provided however that the Parties
shall only be required to present one level of parent-child relationship. Document Images generated
from attachments to emails stored in Native Format shall be produced contemporaneously and
sequentially immediately after the parent email in their Bates numbering.

b. Documents that contain hyperlinks that point to other documents in the possession, custody and
control of the producing party agree to produce the hyperlinked content as above. The Parties
agree that in the cases of hyperlinked content, the treatment of attachment families as described
herein may not be practical. The parties shall meet and confer to determine the appropriate scope of
collection and form of production for hyperlinked content.

7. Duplicates. A Producing Party who has more than one identical copy of an electronic document (i.e., the
documents are actual duplicates) need only produce a single copy of that document. A Producing Party
need not produce the same electronically stored information in more than one form. Deduplication
will be based on the MD5 or SHA1 hash values of native versions of documents, respecting differences
in families (i.e. two duplicates attached to different emails will both be provided). The hash value will
take into account the document’s text and intrinsic metadata (e.g., author, date created, etc.), but not
extrinsic metadata values (e.g., custodian, file path). Emails should be systematically and consistently
deduplicated. A Producing Party shall deliver in its Load File a populated All Custodians and All File
Paths fields that includes the identity of each Custodian whose file(s) was removed as a duplicate of a
produced document and the file path location of that duplicate.

8. Bates Numbering. Each Producing Party shall Bates number its production(s) as follows:

a. Document Images. Each page of a produced Document shall have a legible, unique page identifier
(“Bates Number”) electronically “burned” onto the image at a location that does not unreasonably
obliterate, conceal, or interfere with any information from the source document. The Bates Numbers
shall be enumerated as defined above in Definitions. The Producing Party will use a consistent prefix
throughout the matter. Thus, once a party chooses a two-to-five letter prefix, e.g. ABCD, it shall not
later produce a Document using a different prefix, e.g. EFGH. No other legend or stamp will be placed
on the Document Image other than a confidentiality legend (where applicable), redactions, the Bates
Number identified above. The confidentiality legend shall be “burned” onto each document’s image
at a location that does not unreasonably obliterate or obscure any information from the
source document.

b. Native Format Documents. In the event Native Format Documents are produced, in order to preserve
the integrity of those Native Format Documents, no Bates Number, confidentiality legend or internal
tracking number should be added to the content of the Native Document.
 Everlaw ESI Protocol Template

c. Sort Order. For Bates numbering, documents will be sorted by their original file path in ascending
order, preserving family ordering.

9. Search Terms and Scope of Review. The Receiving Party and the Producing Party shall meet and confer
before agreeing on any use of search terms to identify or exclude electronic documents collected that
will be reviewed for possible production. During the course of the litigation, the Receiving Party and
the Producing Party may modify the search terms by agreement. At its own discretion, a Producing
Party may use Predictive Coding or other form of Technology-Assisted review to minimize the cost and
burden of reviewing non-responsive documents, subject to Rules and case law.

10. Databases. To the extent discovery requires production of discoverable electronic information
contained in a database, in lieu of producing the database, the parties shall meet and confer to, with
an understanding of which fields are relevant, agree upon a set of queries to be made for discoverable
information. The Producing Party shall produce exemplar reports from the database in a reasonably
usable and exportable electronic file (spreadsheet if possible). Upon review of the reports, the Receiving
Party may make reasonable requests for additional information to explain the database schema, codes,
abbreviations, and different report formats or to request specific data from identified fields.

11. Short Messages and Collaboration Tools: The parties agree that Documents to be produced may reside
in short message applications such as text messages, chat, Slack, MS-Teams or other similar platforms
from personal computing devices, cloud-based systems, or business enterprise systems. The parties
shall meet and confer with respect to the scope of production from these applications, the context to be
produced in the case of short messages, and the metadata to be produced if different from the section on
Metadata, below.

12. Privilege Logs. The Producing Parties will produce privilege logs in spreadsheet or .csv format. A
Producing Party will produce a separate privilege log for each production within 20 days after the
production of documents for which a privilege is asserted. The production of a privilege log for a
custodian or his/her department shall be not less than 20 days prior to that custodian’s deposition.
The Producing Party and the Receiving Party may modify the deadlines for production of privilege logs
by agreement.

13. Discovery and Admissibility. Nothing herein shall be construed to affect the discoverability or
admissibility of any document or data. All objections to the discoverability or admissibility of any
document or data are preserved and may be asserted at any time.

14. Metadata. The Producing Party shall produce the metadata information described below with each
production and in the format described above. For each Document, the Producing Party shall produce
a line in the index file with the following fields, where available. The field naming conventions shall
be the following. Datetime metadata will be provided in UTC in a consistent, reasonable, and clearly
delimited format. For example, M/d/y H:m. To the extent timezone information is provided for context,
it will be provided in a separate loadfile field.
 Everlaw ESI Protocol Template

Field Name Description Data Example

Begin Bates Beginning Bates number of first page of Type ABCD000004

a document

End Bates Ending Bates number of last page of Text ABCD000003

a document

Begin Family Begin Bates of parent document of family Text ABCD000001

of attachments

End Family End Bates of last attachment of family Text ABCD000004

pages Number of Bates stamped pages for the PDF Text 3

image each document

Native Path Relative file path of native record within Number .\vol001\natives
production, including filename and 001\ABCD00002.xlsx
extension of native file within the production.
Only for documents produced in
native format

TextPath Relative file path of text record within text .\VOL001\text\001\

production, including filename and ABCD000001.txt
extension of the text file within
the production.

Placeholder If Bates stamped document is produced Text Y

with a placeholder image (values: Y or N)

Redacted If this document has redactions (values: Text Y

Y or N)

All Custodians For deduplicated documents, list of all Text

custodians the duplicate copy was
collected from.

All Paths For deduplicated documents, list of all file Text

paths for duplicate copies.

Author Creator of document Text Jones

Bcc Additional blind recipients of an email (Blind Text [email protected]

Carbon Copy)
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Field Name Description Data Example

Cc Additional recipients of email (Carbon Copy) Text [email protected]

Custodian Name of person from whom documents Text Jones

were collected

Date Created Datetime document was created Datetime 07/21/1969

02:56:00

Date Modified Datetime document was last modified Datetime 07/21/1969

02:56:00

Date Received Datetime document was received Datetime 07/21/1969

02:56:00

Date Sent Datetime an email was sent Datetime 07/21/1969

02:56:00

File Extension The suffix at the end of the end of a native Text .docx
filename indicating file type .pdf
.xlsx

Filename Original filename of native document, Text interesting_spread

including extension sheet.xlsx

File Path Original source file path, including Text media.zip//jones.p st//
location,folder name, filename, sent
and extension mail/444.eml//inter
esting_spreadshee t.xlsx

From Sender Text [email protected]

In Reply To Message id of email this email is in reply to Text

Message Id Unique message id from internet headers Text

MD5 Hash MD5 Hash value of Document MD5 Hash

SHA1 Hash SHA1 Hash value of document SHA1 Hash

Subject Subject line Text Check this out!

To Recipient Text [email protected]