The custodian portal is where the custodian reads the preservation notice, confirms their identity, and acknowledges the duty to preserve. It is a public, single-page experience reached through a secure link in the notice email. After acknowledgment, custodians can optionally complete a questionnaire that maps their channels, devices, and personal cloud accounts.
How the portal works
The preservation notice email contains a single-use secure link. The link opens the acknowledgment page without asking the custodian to create an account. Hintyr verifies the link, confirms the custodian is who the notice was addressed to, captures the clickwrap attestation, and writes the result to the case audit record.
After acknowledging, the custodian can download a receipt and optionally complete the questionnaire from a link on the confirmation page. The same secure link works for both steps; the questionnaire does not consume the link, so the custodian can return later if they need more time.
What custodians do (4 steps)
- Receive the notice email. Subject line names the matter and the firm.
- Click the secure link in the email. The page opens in their browser; no login is required.
- Confirm identity on the prompt that reads, for example, "I am Jordan Hsu," using the Yes, I am or No, this is not me button.
- Check the clickwrap box, click Acknowledge, and download the receipt. The questionnaire link appears on the same page; completing it is optional but encouraged.
Options and fields
Each section of the questionnaire and what it captures:
- Communication channels: a checkbox group for work email, personal email used for work, Slack, Teams, SMS, WhatsApp, Signal, Telegram, Snapchat, Wickr, and voicemail. For each channel the custodian uses, they record dates and the people they communicated with.
- Devices: a multi-select for laptop or desktop, personal mobile, work mobile, and tablet. Each device has a notes field for context.
- Personal cloud accounts used for work: a per-row table for Gmail, iCloud, Dropbox, Google Drive, OneDrive, and Box, with an account identifier field for each one the custodian used.
- Paper records location: a multi-line text field for the home office filing cabinet, the corporate office, off-site storage, or wherever paper records live.
- Auto-delete settings known: a per-channel disclosure that lets the firm find systems with active retention policies that need to be paused.
- External recipients: people outside the organization who may also have responsive records, such as outside counsel, the customer, or a co-defendant.
- Prior deletions after the trigger date: the most important field. Any post-trigger deletion is a flag; the firm needs to know about it early to assess exposure.
- Departure plans: applies when the custodian is leaving or has left the organization. Triggers a separate off-boarding workflow on the firm side.
Non-English custodians
When a custodian's browser language is not English, the acknowledgment page shows a locale banner across the top. The notice is rendered in English; the banner tells the custodian to contact the firm for a translated copy. The questionnaire is also English only in this release. Plan a phone call or in-person walkthrough for any custodian who cannot read the notice in English, and record that you did so in the notice tracking notes.
The audit record captures the custodian's browser language at the moment they opened the link. If a court later asks whether the custodian could read what they acknowledged, you have evidence the firm was aware of the language gap.
Why custodian interviews matter
Sedona Conference Guideline 6 lays out the channel, device, and cloud mapping a firm should do at the start of a matter. The questionnaire structures that mapping into a record the firm can rely on later. It also helps surface personal-channel use the firm would otherwise not know about: a custodian's personal Gmail used for work, a Signal thread with the customer's team, a paper file at a home office.
The questionnaire is not a substitute for an attorney-led interview. Treat it as the structured prompt that prepares the custodian for the live conversation. The free-form fields capture context that the attorney can probe in follow-up.
Edge cases and limits
- A custodian who hits No, this is not me lands on a help page that asks them to contact the firm. Hintyr writes the repudiation to the audit record so the firm can investigate.
- A custodian who closes the tab without acknowledging can re-open the secure link as long as it has not been used and has not expired. The clickwrap state does not persist between visits.
- The acknowledgment link is single use. After acknowledgment, the link returns an "already used" page. Lost or expired links can be re-sent by composing a new Reminder notice.
- Replying to the notice email reaches the preservation contact's inbox, not the portal. Tell custodians where to ask questions in the notice body.