The Pennsylvania Supreme Court has revised rules on the collection of electronic data sought by means of search warrant, endeavoring to clear up any potential confusion in the language of the existing rule.

The clarification to Rule 205 of the Rules of Criminal Procedure came July 31 at the recommendation of the court's Criminal Procedural Rules Committee. The committee also recommended the revision of a comment to Rule 209.

The revision was prompted by a similar change to the commensurate federal rule on gathering electronic evidence.

"The intention of the amendment is to eliminate any confusion that, when a search warrant is for the seizure of electronically stored information and that information must be extracted, reviewed or analyzed, these additional processes do not need to be performed within the period set for execution of the search warrant. This change is based on language that is contained currently in Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 41(B)," the amendment read.

The amendment went on to address the difficulties in gathering electronic evidence through search warrants:

"Searches of electronic storage media are problematic because computers and external electronic storage devices contain an almost incomprehensible amount and variety of data. The use of computers in all stages of life and business has become ubiquitous. This is only further complicated by the storage of electronic data on networks and, with increasing frequency, 'cloud' servers. Additionally, the information is stored as lines of code, often of little practical use without some type of program to convert into a usable form. As a result, it is often impossible to conduct a search on-site for evidence within the computer or server and necessitating analysis by specialists."

The federal rule reflected a two-option scenario, allowing officers to either seize or copy the entire storage medium and conduct a review of it later to determine what stored information falls within the scope of the warrant.

"As in the federal rule, the committee rejected adding a specific time period within which any subsequent off-site copying or review of the media or electronically stored information would take place. Given the vast divergence in the media being searched, there will be wide differences in the amount of time required for forensic analysis and review of information. The committee concluded that if a time limit were set for these processes it would be highly arbitrary and result in frequent petitions for additional time," the amendment read.