Active email collector
AssigneeBank of America Corporation
InventorsDavid M. Andersen, Michael J. Mayer
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
Embodiments of the invention relate to systems, methods, and computer program products for electronic discovery and, more particularly, remotely collecting a custodian's data that is stored in one or more network storage areas residing on a network. For example, embodiments of the present invention utilize a collection tool to access a mailbox residing on an email server, copy at least some of the active email data stored in the mailbox, and transmit the copied active email data from the mailbox to a collection server and then to a long-term storage device.
Claims31
A method for collecting data associated with a custodian and stored in a network storage area that resides on a network, the method comprising:
- identifying an address of a location on the network storage area where the data is located;
- accessing the location on the network storage area where the data is located;
- determining whether the data stored in the location on the network storage area is eligible for collection;
- if the data is eligible for collection, copying the data;
- transmitting the copied data to a staging area;
- determining whether the collection is complete;
- and
- storing the data in a long-term storage device.
A system comprising:
- an email server for servicing a mailbox associated with a custodian, wherein the custodian's data is written to the mailbox;
- a collection tool configured to copy and transfer data from the mailbox of the email server to a long-term storage device by:
- identifying an address of the mailbox;
- using the address to access the mailbox;
- determining whether the data stored in the mailbox is eligible for collection;
- if the data is eligible for collection, copying the data;
- transmitting the copied data to a collection server;
- determining whether all of the data has been copied and transferred from the mailbox to the collection server;
- and
- transmitting the data form the collection server to the long-term storage device.
A computer program product for identifying the path of a personal network storage area residing on a network and belonging to a user, the computer program product comprising a computer readable medium having computer readable program instructions stored therein, wherein said computer readable program instructions comprise:
- first instructions configured for crawling the network;
- second instructions configured for evaluating paths of network storage areas residing on the network to determine if a path contains an identifier associated with a particular user;
- and
- third instructions configured for transmitting to a database each path containing an identifier associated with a particular user and the identifier contained therein such that the identifier and the path may be related in the database.
A computer program product for collecting data associated with a custodian and stored in a network storage area that resides on a network, the computer program product comprising a computer readable medium having computer readable program instructions stored therein, wherein said computer readable program instructions comprise:
- first instruction configured for identifying an address of a location on the network storage area where the data is located;
- second instructions configured for accessing the location on the network storage area where the data is located;
- third instructions configured for determining whether the data stored in the location on the network storage area is eligible for collection;
- fourth instructions configured for copying the data if the data is eligible for collection;
- fifth instructions configured for transmitting the copied data to a staging area;
- sixth instructions configured for determining whether the collection is complete;
- and
- seventh instructions configured for storing the data in a long-term storage device.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.