eDiscovery for regulatory investigation

In less than 10 days, KordaMentha reviewed more than 130,000 documents and presented only relevant documents needed to focus the regulatory investigation. Using machine learning and processing on our eDiscovery platform sped up the process.

Background

A large multinational company was under scrutiny by regulators in relation to allegations of misconduct and bribery. In response to regulatory requirements, a global project was commenced to assess overall operations and improve the company's internal compliance framework. Several suspicious communications were discovered involving the Australian operations which required immediate investigation. The urgency and sensitivity of the matter was heightened due to the company working on classified government contracts.
 
At the commencement of the investigation a significant volume of electronic data was collected for review.  The data was collected from a variety of sources including laptops, mobile phones, enterprise email archives and file servers. Due to information security and privacy concerns, the data needed to be hosted and reviewed within Australia. KordaMentha was appointed to help discover the relevant documents and provide the investigation team with a means to review these documents in a structured manner.

How we helped

We processed more than 2 terabytes of data into our eDiscovery platform (‘Relativity’) to facilitate the review. Initially, all documents were placed in a workspace for triage purposes. We refined the dataset using advanced analytics such as email threading and techniques that deduplicated data from the disparate data sources. We undertook privacy and security assessments to identify any documents that could potentially be classed as ‘private’ or ‘classified’.  Using various criteria, we then identified which documents needed to be reviewed and transferred them to a review workspace. The review workspace was set up to leverage Technology Assisted Review (‘TAR’) – a feature that uses machine learning to speed up document review.

Our client did not have a large review team and asked us to assist with the preliminary review. We initially identified and reviewed documents, only passing on relevant documents to the investigators. Our Managed Review team were assembled in our secure operations room and briefed on the matter by the client. The team, consisting of 17 experienced reviewers, commenced each day with a status briefing and concluded with an update to the client. Throughout the review we actively monitored the TAR process to maintain quality and rectify any inconsistencies. 

Result

By the second day of the review, our team had identified information which significantly changed our client’s understanding of the matter and enabled them to focus the investigation in the right direction. In less than 10 days we reviewed more than 130,000 documents and presented the investigators with a limited quantity of relevant documents to focus on. Our client used these documents to interview their employees and for reporting to the regulator. Over the course of the investigation, we continued to provide ad hoc support to the investigation team.