How to Make Multilingual E-discovery Easier

By Lionbridge Legal

Electronic discovery (e-discovery for short) is an intense process. Data volumes are rising dramatically and will supposedly reach 1230 GB per IT professional by 2020. In 2014, that number stood at just 230 GB.

Despite the exponential increase of data quantity and the still-limited resources companies possess to process it, the US Federal Rules of Civil Procedure require the preservation of all information that might be relevant in litigation.  If lost data leads to prejudice in a case, the party who failed to preserve that data may be subject to sanctions.

The situation is high-pressure, and there aren't always people available with knowledge of the technology behind the process. That adds to the risk involved, especially when an in-house team lacks the proper training on critical tech. The importance of finding a legal partner with the necessary technological, linguistic, and legal expertise to support your e-discovery initiative cannot be overstated.

Let’s Back Up. What is E-discovery?

E-discovery is the process by which electronically-stored information (e.g., emails, intra-company chat, social media, databases, etc.) is collected and produced in response to a legal request for production during discovery. Discovery itself is a complicated and often time-consuming process; e-discovery software adds layers of complication due to the vast amounts of electronic data that exist in most companies.

Multilingual E-Discovery

The process of e-discovery becomes even more complex when the documentation involved has been created in multiple languages. Foreign language documents have to be translated before the actual document review process can even begin. Every new language adds steps to that process and incorporates new personnel, whether those individuals are internally or externally based.

Jurisdictional differences also pose a challenge in these multilingual situations. Local and national preservation laws can conflict with one another, as can procedures for document storage, retrieval, and removal. What seems like common practice in the United States—searching an employee's files as part of discovery, for example—might be prohibited in another locale.

Even transmitting data to a US office can be difficult. Data privacy laws are becoming more intricate across the world. Critical information may be stored in a European Asian or South American office where statutes prohibit the transfer of information to the US.

Regardless of whether a jurisdiction does allow information transfer, it might restrict that transfer to case-relevant information. US courts may also look skeptically at laws of foreign jurisdictions as justifications for non-production. Consequently, laws like this often require companies to review foreign-language documents within the jurisdiction in which they are located.

Ensuring the Right Support for Multilingual E-discovery—The Challenges

Even if you have at your disposal the rare internal team that broadly manages complex e-discovery software, they may not have staff experienced with multilingual and multi-jurisdictional considerations. In cases like these, leading law firms frequently hire a trusted third party to manage multilingual e-discovery.

E-discovery and global translation services, however, are very different areas of expertise. Finding a firm with high levels of expertise in both areas can be challenging.

The Solution: Enabling Translation within Relativity

Relativity e-discovery leads the way in developing innovative and efficient workflow solutions. With the application of machine learning, advanced search tools, and data analytics, Relativity enables lawyers, e-discovery services providers and their teams to employ valuable tech solutions. They can upload, process, organize, analyze and produce large quantities of e-discovery data for content relevant to a matter, while identifying and excluding privileged material

Introducing Lionbridge for Relativity

Lionbridge Legal has provided top-quality language services across industries for more than 20 years. In that time, our legal services experts have provided legal translation and interpretation services to a multitude of global legal clients including 92% of the Global 100 and 94% of the AmLaw 100.

Now, Lionbridge Legal has brought its marketing-leading translation capabilities into the Relativity e-discovery platform with its Lionbridge for Relativity application. Lionbridge for Relativity is a simple, easy-to-use Relativity plug-in that enables integrated end-to-end multilingual e-discovery services fully within the Relativity platform. The Lionbridge Legal Connector provides legal users and their teams with the ability to provide in-app tools that:

• Select either ultra-high-capacity machine translation or world-class human translation, depending on the stage of review
• Obtain a quote / estimate prior to approving translations
• Send and receive documents in compliance with jurisdictional data-sharing regulations
• Upload documents and view the resulting translation material, directly within the Relativity e-discovery app
• Supply case-specific instructions, reference materials, and metadata to improve the efficiency of translation
• Monitor order status, request notifications and review order history
• Provide a highly-secure environment for translations, protecting confidentiality and privacy

Each user of Lionbridge for Relativity receives expert and experienced customer support language services from members of our legal translation solutions team.

Further, in the world of e-discovery, rendering translation services in a timely manner is of the utmost importance. That's why in addition to supporting more than 350 languages, we invest in advanced machine translation solutions that automate foundational stages of the process. This allows us to expedite the processes without sacrificing quality.

The benefits

Lionbridge for Relativity fuses machine learning and human experience to provide our customers with a comprehensive legal translation solution. They have the freedom to focus on what they do best, knowing that Lionbridge Legal will provide accurate multilingual e-discovery translations in a timely fashion. At the same time, they receive time- and cost-efficient language services.

Nowhere else can an e-discovery team receive this kind of expert service while maintaining a hands-on role in the translation process. Our multi-level approach provides services such as:

• Sending and receiving content securely
• Customizing document access
• Integrating translation and discovery processes
• Maintaining inter-team communications to reduce errors and expedite multilingual e-discovery
• Receiving real-time updates on the process, eliminating unnecessary discovery delays

Lionbridge works with Relativity file formats and key operating systems. This makes multilingual e-discovery a truly integrated process.

Why Start Today

Firms and corporations with multinational interests have plenty of challenges facing their operations. The translation process shouldn't be one of them.

Get in touch

See what can happen when the leading global provider of legal translation solutions connects with the Relativity e-discovery platform. Contact the Lionbridge Legal team to learn more.