Introducing Context-Aware eDiscovery: Why Modern Data Requires a Modern Approach

The Practice of eDiscovery Is Changing -  Whether We Acknowledge It or Not

In the 15+ years I’ve spent working with, building, teaching, and writing about eDiscovery, I’ve noticed a pattern: our tools often lag behind the way people actually work. When we moved from paper to electronic documents, the industry adapted. When we shifted to email as the backbone of communication, our processes evolved again.

But today, we’re facing a deeper, more structural shift - one that fundamentally changes how data is created, shared, stored, and understood.

Yet many of our tools still behave as if we live in a world of files and attachments.

Spoiler: we don’t.

And that gap - between how organizations work and how eDiscovery tools interpret their data - is where risk, waste, and defensibility problems quietly accumulate.

Key Takeaways 

• Modern work is collaborative, cloud-native, and dynamic - but eDiscovery tools still assume static files
• Risk and defensibility issues come from missing context, not missing data
• Custodians, repositories, and documents all change over time
• Context-Aware eDiscovery is a new category designed for how work actually happens today

What Does Modern Work Actually Look Like?

Modern work is collaborative, distributed, and constantly changing across cloud platforms. Think about your own workday. When was the last time you emailed a document as an attachment to a colleague? For most of us, it’s rare.

Documents today:

• Live in SharePoint, Google Drive, and Teams
• Are co-authored, commented on, and revised continuously
• Accumulate versions, restructurings, and permissions changes
• Exist not as static files but as evolving artifacts in a collaborative ecosystem

When a legal team later needs to reconstruct “what happened,” the file itself rarely tells the full story.

But this issue goes far beyond documents.

Why Does Custodian Context Break Down Over Time?

Custodian context breaks down because people change roles, teams, and access - but discovery tools usually don’t track that history.

Employees don’t stay locked in single roles or departments. They move between teams, get promoted, switch reporting lines, and take on special assignments.

But when we open an eDiscovery tool and search for a custodian…We only see who they are today.

Not who they were during the period that actually matters.

That creates two major risks:

1. Missing custodians
2. Preserving or collecting incomplete or inaccurate datasets

You cannot rely on a current org chart to understand historical roles - yet this is exactly what most teams unknowingly do.

The result is a lack of context at the most fundamental stage of eDiscovery: identification.

What Is the “Repository Problem”?

The repository problem exists because repository names do not reflect how shared spaces are actually used.

One thing we all know from experience: never assume you know what’s inside a repository based on its label.

A SharePoint site called Product Team might have been:

• Created by one person
• Used heavily by another
• Abandoned after a reorg
• Accessed by contractors or former employees
• Repurposed months later by an entirely different group

But current tools rarely show this history in a meaningful way. They treat repositories as if their names are reliable indicators of scope.

As practitioners, we know better. But that doesn’t mean that we have hadany reliable or defensible way to do anything about it.

Repository context - how a shared space was actually used, by whom, and when - is essential to defensible scoping.

The Problem Isn’t That We Lack Data - It’s That We Lack Context

More data does not solve eDiscovery problems because data without context does not create understanding.

Every enterprise today is rich in logs, metadata, and behavioralsignals:

• Access logs
• Version histories
• Identity attributes
• Role and team changes
• Permission updates
• Repository activity patterns

But none of this intelligence is connected in a way that meaningfully supports eDiscovery workflows.

Our tools give us data, but they rarely give us understanding.

What we need is the context that ties everything together:

• Who created or accessed a document?
• What version existed at the key moment?
• How did a workspace evolve over time?
• Who was on the team during the relevant period?
• Which repositories were actually used by which custodians?

These questions are central to litigation strategy, defensibility, and cost control.

And today, answering them requires guesswork.

Introducing a New Category: Context-Aware eDiscovery

Context-Aware eDiscovery is a modern approach designed for thecollaborative, cloud-native environments where enterprise work now happens.

It’s built on a simple premise:

If we want defensible, efficient eDiscovery, we need more than data. We need the context that gives that data meaning.

Context-Aware eDiscovery focuses on three core dimensions:

1. What Is Identity Context?

Identity context captures who a person was during the relevant timeframe, not just who they are today.

This includes:

• Historical roles and titles
• Team and project membership over time
• Reporting structures
• Access rights as they existed at the time

Accurate identity context is critical for defensible custodian identification and targeted preservation.

2. What Is Behavioral Context?

Behavioral context shows how individuals actually interacted with data and shared spaces.

This includes:

• Which repositories they accessed
• What content they viewed or modified
• Who they collaborated with
• How frequently and during which periods

Behavioral signals provide evidence-based insight into relevance that static metadata cannot.

3. What Is Document Context?

Document context explains how content evolved across platforms and time.

When these elements come together, everything about the discovery process becomes more accurate:

• Custodian identification
• Repository scoping
• Legal hold
• Preservation
• Collection
• Review volume reduction
• Defensibility

It’s a smarter, more defensible model that aligns with how people actually work in 2026.

Why Launch This Category Now?

We are launching Context-Aware eDiscovery now because the industry is ready.

Every corporate legal team I talk to feels the pressure of modern datagrowth:

• Too much data
• Too many systems
• Too little visibility
• Too much risk if they get it wrong
• Too much cost if they collect everything

And frankly, we’re overdue for a shift.

We cannot solve modern problems with pre-cloud tools.

It's time to close the gap between how work happens and how discoveryhappens.

How Does Cloudficient Enable Context-Aware eDiscovery?

Cloudficient enables Context-Aware eDiscovery by making identity, behavioral, and document context visible and actionable.

Our platforms, Expireon and CaseFusion, were built from day one with context in mind.

They:

• Surface hidden custodians
• Reveal repository usage patterns
• Map identity over time
• Provide targeted preservation and collection
• Reduce unnecessary data volume
• Enhance (not replace) enterprise platforms like Purview
• Replace legacy collection tools outright

Cloudficient is introducing Context-Aware eDiscovery at LegalWeek2026, and this blog marks the start of a broader exploration into the concepts, practices, and tools that will define this category.

Join Me on This Journey

The future of eDiscovery isn’t just about collecting less or reviewing faster. It’s about being smarter. It’s about understanding the full story behind the data, not just the files that we extract from it.

Context-Aware eDiscovery is a step forward for the entire industry, and I’m excited to explore it with you in the months ahead.

This article is part of Cloudficient’s Context-Aware eDiscovery™ series leading up to Legalweek 2026.