IRS Email Debacle Underscores Need for Email Archival
Email archiving is important from many different standpoints. Among the positives, there is one very crucial aspect. A proper email archival will save the data in a way that can be easily and reliable accessed when necessary. It seems like an obvious feature, however in an embarrassing turn of events it appears that the IRS email is unable to do just that.
IRS’s Lois Lerner Problem
Lois Lerner was among the agents who had inappropriately used their power to grant tax-exempt status to agencies such as the Tea Party who did not qualify for such status. Lerner was the head of the division of the IRS which was responsible for processing the applications for tax-exempt status.
The Case of the Disappearing Emails
The IRS admitted last week that they are unable to recover Lerner’s emails from a two year period prior to 2011. This is because her computer crashed during the summer of that year. All of that data has most likely been forever lost. This was valuable and important information in regards to this case.
Fortunately, Lerner copied others into some of the emails so not all of the data is lost. The IRS was able to gather approximately 24,000 emails. However, there is no estimation on how many other emails were lost due to the computer crash.
What makes this admission more upsetting to many is that this was something that could have been prevented. With a proper email archiving there is a goal of preventing such loss of data. With regular archival and software updates there should be little to no problems such as this.
Preemptive Strike with Email Archiving Can Save the Day
No one plans for their computer to crash. In fact, that is one of those situations that most people hope never happens to them. When a computer crashes you run the risk of losing everything from your documents, pictures, emails and more.
Steps can be taken to protect yourself (and your data) to prevent losing it. This is through email archival, data storage, and more. It is often up to you or your employer to ensure a reliable archival process is being followed. This can save a lot of issues in the long run.
To learn more about email archival and the benefits and how it can save your day, please contact us.
