System Preserves E-Mail, 'Berry Messages

The administration on Friday disclosed the mechanics of how it is preserving unclassified White House emails, including BlackBerry messages, in response to a settlement between the nonprofit National Security Archive and the Executive Office of the President.

A letter from the office's chief information officer issued to the independent research institute, which collects documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, states, "It is not possible for an individual to remove any messages stored within [the system] without detection."

The letter was part of an agreement that resolved two lawsuits stemming from the discovery in April 2007 that the White House had stopped archiving e-mail in 2003.

Messages in Web-based personal e-mail accounts and instant messages are not an issue because the office's network blocks both applications, it states. While searching through the archived messages is easy, according to the letter, access to the search function is restricted.

The system, which the White House has used since the president took office, stores incoming e-mail in near-real-time and sends identical copies of each message to the intended recipients, according to the letter.

"E-mail messages sent or received via BlackBerry devices flow through the journal servers and are captured in the [same] system in the same manner as e-mails sent or received via the desktop," it adds.

The office uses a product from EMC Corporation called "EmailXtender."

"The White House appears to be approaching its record preservation obligations with greater conscientiousness than during the last administration," Meredith Fuchs, the archive's general counsel, said in a statement.

Kristen A. Lejnieks, counsel for the archive from private law firm Jones Day, added, "While the archive continues to urge the White House to upgrade its system by adding new and better protections against unanticipated problems, the system now in place includes controls and automated reporting that will quickly bring unauthorized actions to light for investigation. We can be much more confident than before that, even if an unauthorized deletion of e-mails could take place, it would be detected by a range of people within the EOP. "