Ride the Lightning

DOJ Attorneys Foul Up Redaction, Jeopardizing Case

October 3, 2017

Gosh, weren't we hearing these stories a decade ago? I am astonished to see that DOJ attorneys redacted information in a major case with what appears to be a black highlighter. Copying and pasting it into a new document revealed the "redacted" information. One sentence was highlighted in black and written in a gray font that was clearly legible.

And as it turns out, the revelation of compelled testimony in a UK probe may torpedo the US case. The DOJ blamed a "technical error in the electronic redaction process" that allowed for "manipulation" of the file's "metadata" (scratching my head at that explanation), but it sure sounds like a human error to me. It is not clear whether there was any understanding of the cross-border implications involved in this error. While the improperly redacted document was publicly available for more than 12 hours and then replaced with a properly redacted version, the damage may be done.

The underlying article is in Law360 (subscription required) but Doug Austin has an excellent summary in his September 8th CloudNine blog post here.

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