Dinowitz asks if linking to OneDrive documents makes messages transitory
Dinowitz asks whether all text messages are transitory and whether sending links to documents stored on OneDrive would avoid FOIL; Smith-Cruz says DORIS would never advise avoiding FOIL, that the record is the document not the link, and that agencies should consider how employees use instant messaging.
Can you say that in English, please?
I didn't quite understand that.
So an example is if you create, thank you for that humor, if you create a document and you save it on your hard drive, or I don't know what we save things on, you save it in your OneDrive, and that's where it lives.
And that would be the record, the document itself.
But if you have drafts of the document, if you have specific, I don't know, like there's moments where you're communicating between folks, but there is a physical object and you want to say you'd send a link.
Here's a link to the document that I just wrote.
So the link can be something that leads to the actual record, which is the document.
The record is the document, not the link.
So the actual, so it doesn't matter.
So in essence.
All text messages are transitory.
So your recommendation for me, if I don't ever want to be foiled, is to put everything on my OneDrive and just send my communications with links over instant messaging because by definition they would then be transitory.
Is that correct?
Thank you for the question.
I would never advise you to not want to be foiled.
We're here for transparency, and that's really important, and we believe in that in our work.
But I would say that we recommend that agencies take the responsibility of considering how they would like their employees to use instant messaging if they're going to use instant messaging at all.
But I want to understand that if...
And to provide guidance on that.
I understand what you're saying, your guidance is.
But if a message has...
Daily updates, talking points, and clips to use in post.
I'm just quoting an article here.
I would read it as that's a substantive message.
It has documents that relate to decisions, actions, or policies in the officer agency.
But what I'm hearing you say is not really, because if you just include a link,
It doesn't really count.
That's kind of what I'm hearing the official guidance to be from Doris.