Brown v. Google LLC
Brown v. Google LLC
Case 4:20-cv-03664-YGR (N.D. Cal. 2020)
October 15, 2020

van Keulen, Susan,  United States Magistrate Judge

Social Media
Attorney-Client Privilege
Email Threading
Search Terms
Technology Assisted Review
Form of Production
Inaccessible
Cooperation of counsel
Attorney Work-Product
ESI Protocol
Waiver
Source Code
Clawback
Scope of Preservation
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Summary
The parties identified liaisons knowledgeable about e-discovery, agreed to cooperate in good faith, discussed preservation obligations, and agreed to use search tools and methodologies, including TAR tools, to identify ESI subject to production. They also agreed to produce documents in certain formats, phase production of ESI, and protect activities undertaken in compliance with the duty to preserve information.
Additional Decisions
CHASOM BROWN, et al., Plaintiffs,
v.
GOOGLE LLC, Defendant
Case No. 20-cv-03664-YGR (SVK)
United States District Court, N.D. California
Filed October 15, 2020
van Keulen, Susan, United States Magistrate Judge

STIPULATED ORDER RE: DISCOVERY OF ELECTRONICALLY STORED INFORMATION

1. PURPOSE 

This Order will govern discovery of electronically stored information (“ESI”) in this case as a supplement to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, this Court’s Guidelines for the Discovery of Electronically Stored Information, and any other applicable orders and rules. 

2. COOPERATION 

The parties are aware of the importance the Court places on cooperation and commit to cooperate in good faith throughout the matter consistent with this Court’s Guidelines for the Discovery of ESI. 

3. LIAISON 

a) The parties have identified liaisons to each other who are and will be knowledgeable about and responsible for discussing their respective ESI. Each e-discovery liaison will be, or have access to those who are, knowledgeable about the technical aspects of e-discovery, including the location, nature, accessibility, format, collection, search methodologies, and production of ESI in this matter. The parties will rely on the liaisons, as needed, to confer about ESI and to help resolve disputes without court intervention. 

b) Google appoints Viola Trebicka, Jonathan Tse, and Josef Ansorge as its e-discovery liaison. 

c) Plaintiffs appoints Beko Richardson, Jean Martin, and Amy Gregory as its ediscovery liaisons. 

4. PRESERVATION 

The parties have discussed their preservation obligations and needs and agree that preservation of potentially relevant ESI will be reasonable and proportionate. To reduce the costs and burdens of preservation and to ensure proper ESI is preserved, the parties agree that: 

a) On or before November 30, 2020, the parties will meet and confer regarding: the types of ESI they believe should be preserved, document retention policies during the relevant time period, sources of custodial and noncustodial data, and the custodians, or general job titles or descriptions of custodians, for whom they believe ESI should be preserved (e.g., “Information Security Officer,” “Information Security Analyst,” “Data Security Analyst,” “Software Engineer,” “Project Manager,” “Program Manager,” “Data Insights Analyst,” “Data Specialist,” and “Marketing Manager”), and a description of Named Plaintiffs’ devices that each has used to  access the Internet over the relevant time period to be agreed-upon by the parties or ordered by the Court. The parties shall meet and confer in order to add or remove custodians and non-custodial data sources as reasonably necessary. 

b) The following data sources are not reasonably accessible because of undue burden or cost pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(b)(2)(B) and ESI from these sources will be preserved pursuant to normal business retention, but not searched, reviewed, or produced: 

1. backup systems and/or tapes used for disaster recovery; 

2. systems, server and network logs; and 

3. systems no longer in use that cannot be accessed. 

c) Among the sources of data the parties agree are not reasonably accessible, the parties agree not to preserve, search, or collect the following: 

1. Automatically saved versions of documents and emails, excluding drafts of emails that were not sent; 

2. deleted, slack, fragmented, or other data accessible only by forensics; 

3. random access memory (RAM), temporary files, or other ephemeral data that are difficult to preserve without disabling the operating system; 

4. temporary internet files, history, and cache; and 

5. data in metadata fields that are frequently updated automatically, such as last opened dates. 

d) In addition to the above, the parties will continue to meet and confer to identify data sources that: 

1) are not reasonably accessible because of undue burden or cost pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(b)(2)(B) where ESI from these sources will be preserved but not searched, reviewed, or produced; and 

2) could contain relevant information but under the proportionality factors set forth in Rule 26(b)(1) should not be preserved.

5. SEARCH 

a) The parties agree that in responding to an initial Fed. R. Civ. P. 34 request, or earlier if appropriate, they will meet and confer about methods to search ESI in order to identify ESI that is subject to production in discovery and filter out ESI that is not subject to discovery. 

b) The parties recognize that a variety of search tools and methodologies, including but not limited to technology assisted review (“TAR”) tools, exist and should be considered and discussed by the parties. 

c) Each party will use its best efforts to filter out common system files and application executable files by using a commercially reasonable hash identification process. Hash values that may be filtered out during this process are located in the National Software Reference Library (“NSRL”) NIST hash set list. Additional culling of file types based on file header information may include: Application Package File, Batch Files, Binary Disc Image, C++ File Formats, Configuration File, Compiled Dynamic Link Library, Event Log Files, Compiled Executable Files, Hypertext Cascading Stylesheet, Macintosh Resource Fork Files, Package Manager Files, Program Installers, Python Script Files, Shell Script Files, System or Temporary Files, Thumbnail Cache Files, Troff Files, TrueType Font Files, Windows Cabinet File, Windows Command Files, Windows File Shortcut, Windows Help Files, Windows Metafiles and Enhanced Metafiles, Windows Spool Files, Windows System File as well as backup files containing only the file types above specified. 

d) The parties agree that they will discuss and strive to agree upon appropriate data sources and custodians each party believes will possess responsive information, and propose search terms (if appropriate). In the event that the producing party proposes to use search terms, it will identify the terms to be utilized; those terms will be subject to negotiation. 

e) The parties recognize that access to Social Media ESI may be limited by the provider of Social Media platforms, and that such access can change rapidly with no notice to parties. Accordingly, the parties shall meet and confer as to the collection and formats of production of responsive Social Media ESI, if any. 

f) A party shall make reasonable efforts to produce only a single copy of a responsive document, and a party may de-duplicate responsive ESI across Custodians through MD5 hash or SourceHash. However, if a document is de-duplicated, (1) all family relationships must be maintained, (2) families shall be de-duplicated only against families, (3) standalone documents shall not be de-duplicated against documents in families, and (4) the producing party must identify each custodian or source where the document was located, as well as the “All Custodians” field of the produced document. Emails in an email thread that are collected and de-duped shall be produced individually as separate documents. The parties agree that email threading may be employed for production of email threads with redactions. The parties retain the right to request production of earlier-in-thread versions of any last-in-thread, redacted documents that are produced. 

g) If applicable, no provision of this Order affects the inspection or production of source code, or any other responsive material which is part of or supports a public-facing web site, which will be collected and made available consistent with the Protective Order governing this case. 

6. PRODUCTION FORMATS 

The parties agree to produce documents in the formats described in Appendix 1 to this Order. If particular documents warrant a different format, the parties will cooperate to arrange for the mutually acceptable production of such documents. The parties agree not to degrade the searchability of documents as part of the document production process. 

7. PHASING 

When a party propounds discovery requests pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P. 34, the parties agree to meet and confer regarding the phasing of production of ESI, if appropriate, by prioritizing selected sources and/or custodians. 

Phasing of production of ESI shall not be used to delay or frustrate discovery in this case. If phasing of production is likely to cause a delay or frustration of discovery the parties shall confer in good faith to modify phasing to expedite discovery. 

8. DOCUMENTS PROTECTED FROM DISCOVERY 

a) Pursuant to Fed. R. Evid. 502(d), the production of a privileged or work-productprotected document, whether inadvertent or otherwise, is not a waiver of privilege or protection from discovery in this case or in any other federal or state proceeding. Disclosures among defendants’ attorneys of work product or other communications relating to issues of common interest shall not affect or be deemed a waiver of any applicable privilege or protection from disclosure. For example, the mere production of privileged or work-product-protected documents in this case as part of a mass production is not itself a waiver in this case or in any other federal or state proceeding. A producing party may assert privilege or protection over produced documents at any time by notifying the receiving party in writing of the assertion of privilege or protection. Information that contains privileged matter or attorney work product shall be returned or destroyed immediately if such information appears on its face to have been inadvertently produced or if requested.
b) Communications involving outside counsel that post-date the filing of the complaint need not be placed on a privilege log. Communications may be identified on a privilege log by category, rather than individually, if appropriate. 
c) Activities undertaken in compliance with the duty to preserve information are protected from discovery under Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(b)(3)(A) and (B). 
d) Nothing in this Agreement shall be interpreted to require disclosure of irrelevant information or relevant information protected by the attorney-client privilege, work-product doctrine, or any other applicable privilege or immunity. Redactions based on relevance are disallowed as a matter of course, but the parties may nonetheless identify documents that they believe should be redacted before productions, triggering an expedited duty to meet and confer. If no agreement can be reached, the party seeking the redaction may seek a protective order in the ordinary course. The parties do not waive any objections to the production, discoverability, admissibility, or confidentiality of documents and ESI. 

9. REMAINING DISPUTES AND MODIFICATION 

The parties acknowledge that there may be certain disputes concerning additional ESI-related issues that the parties were unable to completely resolve prior to preparing this Stipulated Order. Nothing in this Stipulated Order shall prohibit either party from presenting such disputes to the Court for resolution and neither party will argue that such dispute has already been resolved by virtue of the fact that it was omitted from this Stipulated Order.

This Stipulated Order may be modified by a Stipulated Order of the parties or by the Court for good cause shown. Any such modified Stipulated Order will be titled sequentially as follows, “First Modified Stipulated Order re: Discovery of Electronically Stored Information for Standard Litigation,” and each modified Stipulated Order will supersede the previous Stipulated Order. 

10. MISCELLANEOUS PROVISIONS 

a) Any practice or procedure set forth herein may be varied by agreement of the Parties, and first will be confirmed in writing, where such variance is deemed appropriate to facilitate the timely and economical exchange of electronic data or other covered discovery materials. 

b) Should any Party subsequently determine in good faith that it cannot proceed as required by this order or that the order requires modification, the Parties will meet and confer to resolve any dispute before seeking Court intervention.

PURSUANT TO STIPULATION, IT IS SO ORDERED. 

DATED: October 15, 2020

Honorable Susan van Keulen United States Magistrate Judge