Information Management Journal articles from March 2009

Information Management Journal archives from March 2009

An opportune time to prove RIM's value.(IN FOCUS: A Message from the Editor)(records and information management)
March 1, 2009... While most of the world is preoccupied with faltering economies and big-time bailouts, records managers know that the need to properly manage and preserve records at this time in particular must remain--or become--a top priority. In these...

Obama Executive Order limits privilege for presidential records.(GOVERNMENT RECORDS)(Barack Obama)
March 1, 2009... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] One of President Barack Obamas first orders of business after moving into the Oval Office was revoking one of George W. Bush's most controversial orders involving presidential records. On his first day in office,...

Australian web filter plan criticized.(CENSORSHIP)
March 1, 2009... The Australian government is testing a nationwide web-filtering system that has been widely criticized as undemocratic. The plan will require Internet service providers (ISPs) to block access to thousands of sites containing content deemed...

NARA opens 9/11 commission records.(ARCHIVES)(National Archives and Records Administration)(www.archives.gov)(Brief article)
March 1, 2009... The National Archives has opened more than 150 cubic feet of records created by the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the United States--known as the "9/11 Commission"--an independent, bipartisan commission created by Congress. The...

Obama gets approval for 'first smartphone'.(INFO SECURITY)(Barack Obama )(Brief article)
March 1, 2009... U.S. security officials have approved a high-tech, spy-proof, $3,350 smartphone for Barack Obama so he can be the first sitting president to use e-mail. Media reports said the Sectera Edge, made by General Dynamics, is capable of...

Cyber crime soaring in bad economy.(CYBER SECURITY)(Brief article)
March 1, 2009... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The use of malware on websites to steal passwords and other sensitive information is skyrocketing, according to a new report from the Anti-Phishing Working Group (APWG). The number of URLs with hidden code for...

SEC seeks e-records for investment advisers.(FINANCIAL)(Securities and Exchange Commission)(electronic records)(Brief article)
March 1, 2009... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The Securities and Exchange Commission's (SEC) Division of Investment Management is working on rule amendments that will require registered investment advisers to keep all their records in an electronic format. ...

Federal regulations available online.(E-ACCESS)(Office of the Federal Register)(www.federalregister.gov)(Brief article)
March 1, 2009... The Office of the Federal Register has created the Electronic Public Inspection Desk to provide free, worldwide electronic access to public documents. For the first time in the 72-year existence of the daily Federal Register, the documents on...

Beijing Olympic records closed until 2038.(ARCHIVES)(Brief article)
March 1, 2009... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Hundreds of thousands of document files and electronic records documenting the 2008 Beijing Olympics and Paralympics have been transferred to the city's archives as "invaluable cultural heritage" items, but they...

Smithsonian moves toward FOIA.(FOIA)(Freedom of Information Act)(Smithsonian Institution)(Brief article)
March 1, 2009... The Smithsonian Institution, which has long operated outside the reach of The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), has implemented an FOIA-like policy. The policy includes many elements of the open records law, while allowing the...

Federal Court sides with Cheney over retention of VP records.(GOVERNMENT RECORDS)(Brief article)
March 1, 2009... In January, a federal judge ruled that former Vice President Dick Cheney has broad discretion in determining which records created during his eight-year tenure must be retained. U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly ruled that, absent any...

Ohio Supreme Court ruling: e-mails are public records.(E-MAIL)(Brief article)
March 1, 2009... In a landmark ruling, the Ohio Supreme Court decided that electronic messages that address government business--including deleted e-mails--are records protected by the state's open records laws, whether they are stored in a public or private...

U.S. Education Dept. updates student privacy rules.(PRIVACY)(Department of Education)
March 1, 2009... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The U.S. Department of Education has implemented new regulations meant to clarify when universities can release confidential information about students. The move is meant to reassure school officials that the...

Germany approves controversial law.(PRIVACY)(Federal Criminal Police Office)(BKA-law)(Brief article)
March 1, 2009... The German government has passed the "BKA-law," which gives the Federal Criminal Police (BKA) controversial extra powers to fight terrorism. Among the contested powers is the provision that allows the German police to legally engage in...

Data breaches skyrocket in 2008.(DATA SECURITY)(Statistical data)
March 1, 2009... The Identity Theft Resource Center (ITRC) monitors five groups for data breaches annually (see chart). It found that the financial, banking, and credit industries have remained the most proactive groups in data protection over the past three...

UK data centers close to bursting point.(DATA STORAGE)(Brief article)
March 1, 2009... Data centers in the United Kingdom are close to a breaking point, with the majority now running perilously close to storage capacity, according to a recent report. Increased data retention legislation and higher computing requirements have...

EU launches online library.(LIBRARY)(European Union)(www.europeana.eu)
March 1, 2009... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The European Union has launched a massive online digital library that promises to bring Europe's cultural heritage to the world. The Europeana online digital library--www.europeana.eu--allows Internet users to...

UK's archivist groups to merge.(ARCHIVES)(The Society of Archivists)(National Council on Archives)(Association of Chief Archivists in Local Government)(Brief article)
March 1, 2009... The United Kingdom's three leading archivist organizations--The Society of Archivists (SoA), National Council on Archives (NCA), and Association of Chief Archivists in Local Government (ACALG)--have agreed to merge. A legal merger is...

Bush gone, but e-mail problems linger.(GOVERNMENT RECORDS)
March 1, 2009... Less than a week before the Obama administration moved into the White House, the Bush administration was ordered to turn over any electronic devices that may contain e-mails from between March 2003 and October 2005, a period from which millions...

Outgoing NC Gov. decides e-mail should be saved.(E-MAIL)
March 1, 2009... On his last day in office January 9, North Carolina Gov. Mike Easley signed an executive order declaring that e-mail messages are public records and should be saved. The move shocked news organizations that sued him over the issue last...

Can NARA handle onslaught of Bush e-records?(ARCHIVES)(National Archives and Records Administration)(electronic records)(Report)
March 1, 2009... National Archives officials estimate that the electronic records of the George W. Bush years are about 50 times as large as those left by the Clinton White House in 2001, and they include everything from top-secret e-mail plans for the Iraq war...

U.S. archivist Weinstein resigns.(ARCHIVES)(Allen Weinstein)(Brief article)
March 1, 2009... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Allen Weinstein, Archivist of the United States, submitted his resignation to President Bush, effective December 19, 2008. Weinstein, who has Parkinson's disease, cited health reasons for his decision. Deputy...

Nationwide e-health records by 2014?(E-HEALTH)(electronic health records)
March 1, 2009... President Barack Obama has plans to standardize and computerize all health records within five years as part of his effort to boost the U.S. economy. But experts say the hurdles are great. For example, only 8% of the nation's 5,000...

Facing the economic storm: navigating RIM programs through hard times: business unit managers can help steer their programs through the current economic storm by providing leadership, capitalizing on new opportunities, and planning for the future.(records and information management)
March 1, 2009... The United States and many other nations are experiencing the most severe recession since the Great Depression of the 1930s. Financial institutions are collapsing, companies are downsizing, and the retail industry is reeling. The current...

Cost containment: through a robust RIM program.(records and information management)
March 1, 2009... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The December 2006 amendments to the U.S. Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (FRCP) codified parties' obligations regarding the identification, preservation, and production of electronic information in response to a...

Technology tips for cutting e-discovery costs.
March 1, 2009... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] There is one sound always associated with announcing the estimated costs of electronic discovery. It is a gasp. Sometimes accompanied by a wheeze of pain, sometimes by a grunt of reluctant acceptance, and sometimes...

Cooperative process for minimizing discovery burden, expense.(electronically stored information)
March 1, 2009... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The challenges associated with discovery in the world of increasingly voluminous and complex electronically stored information (ESI) are well documented. These challenges call for a different approach to how parties...

How to successfully implement an e-records management program: recognizing the need for collaboration, the records management and information technology departments of the company highlighted in this case study partnered to implement a successful enterprise-wide electronic records management program.(CASE STUDY)
March 1, 2009... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Building on its successful implementation of an e-mail management program, the company featured in this case study turned to holistic e-records management. From its inception, the project's fast pace drove its...