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2026 Collaboration Data Risk & Readiness Report
The first benchmark study of its kind, drawing on 241 legal and IT professionals from across the U.S., reveals how organizations are really managing collaboration data when disputes arise, and what separates those thriving from those barely keeping up.
The data tells the story
Collaboration platforms have become the nervous system of the modern enterprise. When disputes arise, they've also become its biggest liability.
39% of new data sources are discovered mid-collection. Two in five matters require teams to adjust scope after collection has already started, forcing costly restarts and re-collection cycles.
4–7 business days to complete a single collection. Less than 5% of organizations can access collaboration data within 24 hours. A third takes more than a week, a critical liability when investigations demand speed.
10+ collaboration platforms on average are managed per matter. Each has its own access controls, export formats, and workflows, multiplying the surface area for error.
70% of organizations face friction accessing audit logs. Despite most organizations expressing confidence in their defensibility posture, nearly three in four encounter inconsistency or gaps in documentation when put to the test.
57% of teams rate IT dependence at 7 out of 10 orhigher. Even organizations with dedicated eDiscovery teams rely heavily on IT, creating bottlenecks tied to ticket queues.
46% annual growth in collaboration data volume. Enterprise collaboration data doubles every 22 months. The continued use of AI tools like ChatGPT and Claude is set to accelerate this further, and most organizations aren't ready.
"The surface area for error grows wider with every new platform adopted, and the organizations that treat this complexity as background noise do so at their own peril."
Everything your legal and IT team needs to benchmark
The 2026 Collaboration Data Risk & Readiness Report is the most comprehensive analysis to date of how 241 enterprises are navigating collaboration data preservation, collection, and defensibility, and what the leaders are doing differently. Here's what the report covers and why it matters for your team:
Data visibility & platform sprawl
How fragmented your peers' data environments really are and why discovery gaps start before a matter even opens.
Collection process benchmarks
Speed, standardization, scope, and how long collections take, who owns them, and where the process breaks down.
Preservation & defensibility gaps
The uncomfortable disconnect between confidence in the preservation process and what the data says about audit log readiness.
The true cost of collaboration data
From internal labor to outside counsel fees and how data volume and process failures are quietly becoming a major cost center.
The AI data frontier
What the explosion of AI-generated content from tools like ChatGPT and Claude means for organizations already stretched thin.
Process maturity & the IT dependency trap
Why informal workflows and over-reliance on IT ticket queues are quietly becoming the biggest bottlenecks to litigation readiness.
241 voices. 13 industries. One clear picture.
Conducted in partnership with CensusWide, a member of theMarket Research Society, this study captured responses from 241 senior and executive-level legal and IT professionals across 13 U.S. industries between February and April 2026.
Participants spanned small businesses to Fortune 1000 enterprises, with the highest representation from IT & Telecoms, Finance, and Healthcare, the sectors where eDiscovery risk is highest and the stakes are steepest.
Ready to see where you stand?
Download the 2026 Collaboration Data Risk & Readiness Report and find out how your organization compares and what it takes to pull ahead.