Government organisations and emails/digital storage policies

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mattwnz

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#144174 9-May-2014 17:45

Anyone know if there are any legislation or standards for government departments over digital storage and emails. eg what happens if a government employee deletes an important email. Are they required to maintain backups?

Mark

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#1040989 9-May-2014 18:11

Employee : Not up to them, even if they do "delete" the email it should only be a copy of the email they are deleting.
Government : probably yes they are required to keep everything for a number of years, they should have copies of everything going in and out which should then get shuffled off to archive storage.

mattwnz

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#1040991 9-May-2014 18:16

Mark: Employee : Not up to them, even if they do "delete" the email it should only be a copy of the email they are deleting.
Government : probably yes they are required to keep everything for a number of years, they should have copies of everything going in and out which should then get shuffled off to archive storage.

Thanks, that is what I thought. I have been told by a CEO of a council that email correspondence (within the last 6 months) was deleted by an employee, so they no longer have a record of it. Do you know what legislation it is covered by? So far I can only see ICT guidelines at http://www.ict.govt.nz/programmes/open-and-transparent-government/toolkit-agencies/, but not sure if they are binding or just best practice.

Behodar

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#1040992 9-May-2014 18:19

I *believe* that councils are under guidelines rather than legislation, and that those guidelines call for seven years. I believe that the guidelines are set by ALGIM.

I could be totally wrong :)

Jase2985

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#1040993 9-May-2014 18:19

you know council does not equal government department right?

sdav

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#1040997 9-May-2014 18:23

I guess it also depends what the conversation is about? I can't imagine them having to keep absolutely everything.

mattwnz

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#1040998 9-May-2014 18:25

Jase2985: you know council does not equal government department right?

Yes, I intially referred to it incorrectly. Although they are local government, so the rules should be the same, or at least similar I would have thought.

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mattwnz

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#1041000 9-May-2014 18:27

sdav: I guess it also depends what the conversation is about? I can't imagine them having to keep absolutely everything.

It was a council matter concerning property. Not sure about how they would deal with personal emails though. I know someone who works for council and they don't use that address for anything personal.

TwoSeven

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#1041007 9-May-2014 18:39

Might not this be the domain of the Public Records Act (PRA)

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mattwnz

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#1041011 9-May-2014 18:45

TwoSeven: Might not this be the domain of the Public Records Act (PRA)

Thanks, that could be what I am after.

fastmikey

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#1041298 10-May-2014 12:07

Working for a University, I can confirm that's 100% what you're after.

http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/2005/0040/latest/DLM345529.html

Read here if you want some more non-legislative wording on what they're required to do...

http://archives.govt.nz/advice/public-records-act-2005

sdav

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#1041395 10-May-2014 16:56

mattwnz:
sdav: I guess it also depends what the conversation is about? I can't imagine them having to keep absolutely everything.

It was a council matter concerning property. Not sure about how they would deal with personal emails though. I know someone who works for council and they don't use that address for anything personal.

Ah right, yeah that would be weird to delete the emails in that case I would have thought.

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mattwnz

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#1041410 10-May-2014 17:31

fastmikey: Working for a University, I can confirm that's 100% what you're after.

http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/2005/0040/latest/DLM345529.html

Read here if you want some more non-legislative wording on what they're required to do...

http://archives.govt.nz/advice/public-records-act-2005

Thanks. Yes I think that pretty much covers it.