Alabama State Bar Office of General Counsel, Disciplinary Commission
Topic: Disclosure and mining of metadata
Digest of the Commission:
“Lawyers have a duty under Rule 1.6 to use reasonable care when transmitting electronic documents to prevent the disclosure of metadata containing client confidences or secrets. Absent express authorization from a court, it is ethically impermissible for an attorney to mine metadata from an electronic document he or she inadvertently or improperly receives from another party.”
Rules: Alabama Rules of Professional Conduct 1.6 and 8.4
Cited Opinions:
New York State Bar Opinion 749
New York State Bar Opinion 782
The full text is available at http://www.alabar.org…