Costs associated with e-discovery can be enormous. That’s not news. What is news is the courts' increased willingness to award a prevailing party e-discovery costs under 28 USC §1920(4).

The statute had been limited to the recovery of “[f]ees for exemplification and the costs of making copies of papers....” In light of the increasing importance of e-discovery, the statute was amended – and “papers” changed to “any materials.” This change has facilitated the courts' ability to award costs incurred in the process of producing electronically stored information during discovery.