Email destruction issues in Burst v Microsoft

Although Microsoft has settled many litigations, the one involving Burst.com remains and now involves allegations of destruction of email evidence. Burst.com sued Microsoft in June 2002, alleging Microsoft developed its own multimedia software for moving audio and video more quickly over the Internet after discussing the technology for months with Burst.

In a recently unsealed motion, Burst.com asserts Microsoft:

-->told workers, beginning in 1995, not to save e-mails to corporate servers.


-->maintained its deletion policy by creating servers that forced workers to "auto-delete" e-mails.


-->"carefully limited the employees it asked to preserve documents for litigation, and excluded key employees ... This has meant that a large number of core documents simply no longer exist."


-->and has "concealed or falsely described its document retention practices in past litigation."

Burst.com attorney Spencer Hosie: "Microsoft is a very clever company, and it saw earlier than most how damaging e-mails can be to corporate America." Microsoft denies it did anything wrong.