WORM storage, automatic retention policies, legal hold and the controlled keeping of documents.
Keeping documents is not storage
Keeping documents on a disk is not archiving them. Archiving means knowing, for each document, how long it must be kept, for what reason, who can decide its disposal, and how you prove, years later, that the document has not been changed in the meantime.
In public administration, retention periods come from the archival nomenclature and from the legislation specific to each document type. In the private sector, they come from accounting law, contracts and internal policies. In both cases, the periods differ from one category to another, and applying them by hand, on large volumes, is not sustainable.
What WORM, retention and legal hold mean
WORM — write once, read many — describes a regime in which a document, once stored, can be read as often as needed but can no longer be changed or deleted before its term. It is the mechanism that turns a copy into evidence: if the document could not be changed, today’s content is the content of then.
Retention policies link each document to a retention period, calculated from the date relevant to its category. When the period ends, the document enters a selection process, not a silent automatic deletion: disposal remains a decision, recorded as such.
Legal hold suspends disposal. When a document becomes part of a litigation, an inspection or an internal investigation, it is marked and can no longer be disposed of, even if its retention period has ended. The hold is lifted explicitly too.
- WORM regime for the documents stored in the archive;
- retention periods per category, applied automatically;
- legal hold that suspends disposal, with explicit lifting;
- disposal as a recorded process, not a silent deletion.
What the organisation gains
Volume goes down where it can, without the risk of losing what had to be kept. Documents past their period do not pile up forever, and those that must be kept stay kept, with proof of their integrity.
And at an inspection, the discussion is about documents, not about the archiving procedure. You can show which policy applies to each category, what was disposed of, when and on what basis.
Questions and answers
Does electronic archiving replace the physical archive?
It covers both as a record. Born-digital documents are kept electronically, and for physical archival units the record of entries, exits and the depository is kept. What is kept on paper remains a decision of the organisation and of the applicable law.
Who can dispose of a document?
Disposal is a process with its own rights and its own record, not an ordinary delete operation. The roles that can start and approve it are configured.
What happens to a document under legal hold?
It cannot be disposed of while the mark is active, even if its retention period has ended. Lifting the mark is an explicit operation that stays on record.
How do you prove a document has not been changed?
Through the WORM regime and the cryptographically chained audit log, which shows whether there was any intervention and where.