Classifying and Intelligently Archiving Email

allow for certain actions to be takenon messages, including retention setting, exclusion and flagging for review.

Integration with ECM

Of course, many organizations already have an ECM system in place that categorizes and manages records across multiple content types. These systems can be integrated with intelligent email archiving systems to allow the archive to store and optimize email while enabling the ECM system to drive retention decisions that are consistent across different types of data. Once messages are in the integrated system, users can browse and search for messages managed by the system.

For external management of retention policies, objects are created in the ECM system that reference archived messages in the intelligent archiving system. These objects are then controlled by the ECM system’s standard policies, which age objects through configured retention lifecycles and ultimately delete objects as they reach expiration. When a retained message is deleted with the ECM system, the integration ensures that the corresponding archived message is removed from the archive.

Putting Intelligence to Work

Once messages are categorized using user or automated classification or integration with ECM systems, the intelligent archiving system leverages intelligent filtering to delete non-relevant email before archiving, intelligent retention to determine how long to keep archived emails based upon their classification and intelligent discovery or review to tag emails with metadata to make them easier to search and discover in the future.

Organizations can also augment the benefits of an intelligent archiving system with best practices for email retention. These include archiving all email for at least the same period of time that backup tapes were retained.

It is also recommended that organizations place holds on all email that is subject to outstanding investigations to ensure it is not deleted within the 90-day window established under new amendments to the United States Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Organizations should also ask users to drag email into records folders in their email system to classify email that needs to be stored for longer than the default period; these folders should be pushed out only to users who tend to be process-oriented.

Finally, organizations should apply a default policy using automated classification for other groups of users and enforce an overriding policy to retain email that has been flagged as containing sensitive information.

Regardless of the direction an organization takes for managing email, adding intelligence to their archiving policies helps ensure the balance of storage optimization, records retention and fast discovery while capturing the business value of email archiving implementations. Symantec is a world leader in providing solutions to help individuals and enterprises assure the security, availability and integrity of their information.

Store, Manage and Discover

Symantec Enterprise Vault™ provides a software-based intelligent archiving platform that stores, manages and enables discovery of corporate data from email systems, file server environments, instant messaging platforms and content management and collaboration systems. Because not all data is created equally, Enterprise Vault utilizes intelligent classification and retention technologies to capture, categorize, index and store target data in order to enforce policies and protect corporate assets while reducing storage costs and simplifying management. Enterprise Vault also provides specialized applications, such as Discovery Accelerator and Compliance Accelerator, that mine archived data to support legal discovery, content compliance, knowledge management and information security initiatives.

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Headquartered in Cupertino, California, Symantec has operations in more than 40 countries. For white papers, resources and demos visit: www.enterprisevault.com