E-mail as a public record - When in doubt, keep your e-mail!

From OIT News
Monthly news briefs, information and announcements
Office of Information Technology, NC State University
Issue 21, July 2009

The University E-mail Retention Regulation is currently under review, and the university is investigating technology solutions to meet its legal obligations to preserve e-mail. In the meantime, the Office of Information Technology would like to remind faculty and staff of the current e-mail retention policy.

Faculty and staff have the responsibility to preserve all e-mail and other electronically transmitted documents of a non-transient nature that is related to the public business of the university. This information is public record and belongs to the people of North Carolina.

Employees should conduct work-related business through university e-mail systems. This practice makes complying with records requests much easier and can help prevent your personal e-mail accounts from also being subjected to discovery or subpoena for university business e-mails.

OIT recommends that you do not use university e-mail accounts for personal purposes, although the university generally allows personal use of its e-mail systems for non-commercial, incidental use. As a state employee, your university e-mail account is not considered private because of business and legal demands of the university. E-mail in that account is subject to business information needs, legal discovery and public records requests, and as such, the university can access that e-mail. The university can also review, delete or retain the information in your e-mail account for work purposes after you leave the university.

In most cases, when you leave the university, you will lose access to your university e-mail account and any personal e-mail it may contain. This means you must create another account elsewhere and communicate that change to all your personal e-mail contacts that had been using your university e-mail address. Google, Hotmail and Yahoo offer free e-mail services with basically unlimited storage. You can satisfy your personal e-mail needs with any of these good alternatives on a long-term basis.

For more information about e-mail retention, visit the University E-mail Retention Regulation Web page.

Information presented here is provided as a general information resource. Any mention of commercial products is for information only; it does not imply recommendation, endorsement nor support by Extension IT.