NARA: OSD 'likely' not properly managing email and shared file records

The office of secretary of defense is likely not undertaking proper records disposition of emails and shared files, says a National Archives and Records Administration inspection report (.pdf) obtained by FierceGovernmentIT. The report, dated December 2010, is not classified nor otherwise restricted from public distribution.

The report examines, in particular, record keeping by the office of the undersecretary of defense for intelligence, but also other wider OSD records management efforts. Because OUSD(I) staff do not consistently properly manage old emails and shared drive files, "NARA therefore considers it likely that proper disposition is not being carried out for emails and shared drives files throughout OSD," the report states.

Emails with a classification rating of up to "secret" from within OUSD(I) and the rest of OSD--with the notable exception of secretary of defense and deputy secretary of defense emails--currently get uploaded into a Symantec system called Enterprise Vault. Shared drive files, again up to the "secret" level, not modified for a year automatically also move into a file storage part of eVault. OSD plans to expand eVault to include documents at higher classification levels, the report says.

But, eVault isn't a records management application and the OSD chief information officer treats files within it as "non-records." The system's main purpose is for e-discovery, the report adds.

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Source: Fierce GovernmentIT
By: David Perera