Overview
ISO/IEC 27050-2:2018 - "Information technology - Electronic discovery - Part 2: Guidance for governance and management of electronic discovery" provides guidance for senior technical and non‑technical personnel on governing, managing and controlling electronic discovery (e‑discovery) processes. The standard helps organizations identify and assign ownership of e‑discovery risks, set policies that support process control, achieve compliance with external and internal requirements, and implement controls for handling Electronically Stored Information (ESI).
Key topics and technical requirements
The document covers governance and management topics that support robust e‑discovery and information security practices. Key topics include:
- Governance principles and mandate: roles, responsibilities and strategic direction for e‑discovery risk owners.
- Risk identification and ownership: identify systemic and unpredictable failure points and assign accountability.
- Policy design for process control: how to create archival, discovery, disclosure, capability, risk‑compliance and monitoring policies that map to operational controls.
- E‑discovery process elements: guidance aligned with ESI identification, preservation, collection, processing, review, analysis, production, provenance and chain of custody.
- Technical challenges: managing metadata, large ESI volumes, OCR/indexing, encryption/password protection and risks of data corruption that affect evidential value.
- Monitoring, reporting and effectiveness review: metrics, process control, communication and vendor management to ensure conformance.
- Risks and environmental factors: privacy, reputational impact, staff morale, detection of other legal issues and organizational disruption.
- Compliance and review: structural requirements for process delivery, conformance checks and continuous improvement.
Practical applications and users
ISO/IEC 27050-2 is practical for organizations that need to govern e‑discovery as part of legal, regulatory or internal compliance programs. Typical users include:
- Senior management and board members setting strategy and risk appetite for e‑discovery governance
- Legal and compliance teams overseeing litigation, regulatory requests and disclosure policies
- IT governance, security and records management teams implementing ESI preservation, collection and chain‑of‑custody controls
- E‑discovery practitioners and service providers defining workflows, tool capabilities and vendor contracts
- Audit and risk teams monitoring effectiveness and reporting on compliance
Use cases include developing organization‑level e‑discovery policies, defining roles for risk ownership, establishing technical controls for collection and preservation of ESI, and designing monitoring/reporting frameworks.
Related standards
Keywords: ISO/IEC 27050-2, electronic discovery, e-discovery governance, ESI, chain of custody, information security, compliance, risk management.