1 · Overview

InsightOptix is a legal-hold and eDiscovery platform that manages the full lifecycle of a preservation obligation — from the moment a legal event creates the duty to preserve, through custodian notification and acknowledgment, data-source identification, evidence tracking and chain of custody, to eventual release when the obligation ends. It replaces spreadsheets, email threads, and disconnected point tools with a single system of record for your matters, custodians, holds, and evidence.

Two products, one platform

InsightOptix delivers two products from the same application. Which one you are working in is determined by the tier of the matter you open:

• A Full matter is branded EvidenceOptix — the complete eDiscovery workspace, including interviews, assessments, and collection scenario modeling.
• A Legal Hold matter is branded Legal Hold Evolve — a streamlined legal-hold workspace built around issuing holds, tracking acknowledgments, and identifying data sources without the added eDiscovery stages.

The two tiers share the same core: legal-hold issuance and release, Microsoft 365 integration, evidence-item tracking, chain-of-custody reporting, data-source profiles, and surveys. The difference is the eDiscovery layer. The table below shows what each tier includes.

Who uses InsightOptix

What you can see and do depends on the role you have been granted. You may hold different roles in different matters. The roles you will encounter are:

The matter lifecycle at a glance

A matter moves through a flexible lifecycle. Stages can run in sequence, in parallel, or iteratively — holds can be reissued, custodians added or removed mid-hold, and evidence collected while surveys are still out.

1. Create the matter and choose its tier (Full or Legal Hold).
2. Add custodians — the people whose data may need to be preserved.
3. Issue the legal hold and track notification, acknowledgment, and escalation.
4. Send surveys to gather information from custodians. Full matters can also run interviews and an assessment.
5. Identify data sources for each custodian. Full matters approve data sources through PDA collection scenario modeling before downstream work.
6. Preserve and collect evidence, maintaining chain of custody, and generate reports.
7. Release the hold and close the matter when preservation obligations end.

2 · Logging In

InsightOptix signs you in through a central login application shared across the platform. You enter your credentials once, and the login app securely hands you off to your instance. You do not maintain a separate password for each matter or instance.

Multi-factor authentication

After your password, InsightOptix asks for a second factor to confirm your identity. Depending on how your account is set up, you will either:

• Open your authenticator app (such as Google Authenticator or Microsoft Authenticator) and enter the current 6-digit code, or
• Enter the SMS code sent to your verified mobile number.

Enter the code and continue. You manage which methods are enabled — and enroll an authenticator app or verify a phone number — from your account security settings.

Choosing your tenant or instance

Many users belong to a single instance and go straight to the Matter List after authentication. If your account has access to more than one tenant or instance, InsightOptix presents a selection step so you can pick where to work. You can return to the login app later to switch to a different one without signing in again.

Landing on the Matter list

Once you have authenticated and selected an instance, InsightOptix opens the Matter List — your home base. From here you search for a matter, open it, and move into its workspace. The Matter List is covered in the next chapter.

3 · Matter Dashboard

The Matter List is the first screen you see after signing in, and it is where you find and open the matter you need. Selecting a matter takes you to that matter's home dashboard.

The Matter List

Matters are shown in a sortable, filterable table. A count above the table tells you how many matters you are viewing (and, when filters are applied, how many of the total match). The default columns are:

Two more columns — Primary Contact and Practice Area — are available but hidden by default. Use the column-configuration control (the gear above the table) to show or hide any column; your choices are remembered for next time.

Searching and filtering

A filter row sits directly under the column headers, so you filter each column independently:

• For most columns, type into the Filter… box to match rows containing that text. Active filters are outlined in teal.
• Matter Type and Matter Category are dropdowns — pick an exact value, or All to clear.
• Click any sortable column header to sort; click again to reverse the order. An orange arrow marks the sorted column.

Results are paginated at 25 matters per page, with page controls below the table showing the range you are viewing.

The matter home dashboard

Opening a matter takes you to its dashboard — the landing page for that matter. The matter's name appears in the header, with a back link to return to the Matter List.

The dashboard is a personal, drag-and-drop board of widgets, each scoped to the matter you opened. Widgets summarize the matter at a glance — for example, hold and compliance status, custodian counts, and data-source progress — and many are clickable, taking you to a filtered list of the underlying items.

• Rearrange widgets by dragging them into the order you prefer.
• Select Widgets (top right) to open the picker and add or remove widgets.
• Remove a single widget directly from its card.

Your widget layout is per-user and carries across every matter you open, so the dashboard shows the same set of measures re-run for whichever matter you are in. If a dashboard is empty, select Widgets to add some.

4 · Evaluation Module

The Evaluation Module is the working grid at the center of a matter. It lists every custodian as a row, with each stage of the workflow as a column, so you can see where every custodian stands and act on them without leaving the page.

The Evaluation grid at a glance

Each cell shows a status circle you can read at a glance. The stage columns are:

Status circles share one color language across the whole module:

Legal Hold + Legal Hold Survey

The Legal Hold columns are where you issue a hold to each custodian, send the hold notice, track who has acknowledged, and follow the Legal Hold Survey to completion. This flow is available in both matter tiers.

Issuing a legal hold. Issuing a hold creates the preservation obligation for a custodian and prepares the hold notice. You can issue for one custodian or many at once.

Sending the Legal Hold Notice. The hold notice is the email that tells a custodian they are subject to a legal hold and asks them to acknowledge it.

To re-prompt custodians who haven't acknowledged, use Send Legal Hold Follow-Up. Automatic reminders may also go out on the schedule set in Legal Hold Settings; a manual follow-up does not replace them.

The Legal Hold Survey. The survey collects information from the custodian about their potentially relevant data. How it starts depends on the matter's configuration:

Completing a Legal Hold Survey. Custodians complete the survey in the Custodian Portal from the link in their email. Use the flow below to guide a custodian who needs help.

Tracking & follow-ups. From the grid you can see who still owes an acknowledgment or a survey and act on it: filter Hold Accepted to Not started to find who hasn't acknowledged, filter Survey Status to Survey Started to find unfinished surveys, or open a custodian's Actions menu to review their notice history and send a single reminder.

Custodian Relevancy Assessment

The Custodian Relevancy Assessment is the structured evaluation that decides whether a custodian stays in the matter and, if retained, how relevant they are. You answer a short set of scored questions about the custodian, the system tallies a score, and you record a Retain or Release decision. A Retain outcome stamps the custodian with a relevancy rank (a tier from Low to Priority) that then drives sorting and prioritization across the matter; a Release outcome hands the custodian to the matter's release workflow.

You reach an assessment from the Evaluation grid. Each custodian row has an Assessment Status circle; clicking it opens that custodian's assessment runner. The runner header reads Assessment — [custodian name] with the assessment name beneath it, and a status badge in the top-right shows In progress, Retained, or Released.

How the tier is set depends on the assessment's scoring mode. In Proportional (auto) mode the system derives the rank automatically from the percentage score (total earned score against the maximum possible). In Manual Ranges mode the matter admin defines the score bands, so no automatic rank is applied. In either case, the rank is written to the custodian only when you record a Retain decision — releasing a custodian lets the release workflow own the outcome instead.

Interview

The Interview is a guided, side-by-side review of what a custodian told you in their survey. It opens in a split-screen conduct view: the custodian's survey answers sit on the left, read-only and always preserved, while your interview answers go on the right, where you can edit, correct, and add follow-up. A push action copies a survey answer straight across when it needs no change, and you verify each answer before finalizing. Finalizing promotes the confirmed data sources into the Proportional Discovery Assessment® (PDA).

You reach the interview from the Evaluation grid: click a custodian's Interview Status circle. If no interview exists yet the system creates one, then opens the split-screen conduct view. The teal header shows the custodian's name and phone numbers, the relevant timeframe, department and title, and a running verify counter.

Each question appears as a paired row, numbered Q1, Q2, and so on:

Data Sources, Custodian Rank & Custodian Report

Beyond the survey, assessment, and interview status circles, the Evaluation grid rolls up three at-a-glance outcomes for each custodian: how many data sources they have, their Custodian Rank, and a one-click Custodian Report. Together these let you triage a whole matter's custodians from a single screen.

Custodian Report. Clicking the report icon in the Custodian Report column generates a fresh PDF for that custodian and opens it in an inline preview titled Custodian Report — [custodian name]. The report is built on demand each time you open it, so it always reflects the current state of the custodian's survey, assessment, interview, and data sources. Use Save as PDF in the preview header to download a copy to share; generated files are retained for seven days.

5 · Proportional Discovery Assessment® (PDA) Module

The Proportional Discovery Assessment (PDA) module helps you decide what to collect before you collect it. Using the relevance ranks and burden scores captured during custodian assessments and data-source interviews, PDA plots every custodian and data source on a burden-versus-priority grid, attaches a cost estimate to each, and lets you build and compare collection scenarios. You approve only the data sources that are proportional and defensible, then hand that approved scope off to the collection workflow.

Think of PDA as the bridge between assessment and collection: assessment tells you how relevant and how burdensome each source is; PDA turns those signals into a scoped, costed, defensible collection plan.

You reach PDA from a matter's top navigation. The module is organized as five sections shown as links in the blue header bar: Dashboard, Custodian Status, Data Source Status, Scenario Approval, and Approved List. Work generally flows left to right — review the picture, set statuses, build scenarios, approve, then read out the approved scope.

PDA Heatmap

The Dashboard section is the PDA heatmap — a visual overview of every ranked custodian and data source in the matter, arranged by priority and burden. It answers the first proportionality question at a glance: where is the relevant, low-effort evidence, and where would collection be expensive relative to its value?

The grid reads along two axes:

• Vertical axis — Relevance. Sources near the top carry Priority Relevance; sources near the bottom carry Low Relevance. This comes from the custodian or data-source rank (1–4).
• Horizontal axis — Effort / Burden. Sources on the left are Low Effort to preserve and collect; sources on the right are Burdensome Effort.

Those axes divide the chart into four quadrants:

Each quadrant is subdivided into four cells (16 cells across the whole grid), giving you finer rank-and-effort resolution. Every cell — and every quadrant label — shows three numbers: the count of custodians, the count of data sources, and an estimated cost.

Use the Cost estimate toggle at the top to switch the dollar figures between Low, Medium, and High assumptions. This lets you frame the same population conservatively or aggressively when you present scope to the team.

The heatmap is interactive:

• Click a single cell to drill into just that rank-and-effort square.
• Click a quadrant label to drill into all four of its cells at once.
• Click Chart All › below the grid to open the full drill-down for every source.

The drill-down view breaks the selected population down by data-source category, geography, and cost, and lists the underlying evidence items.

Custodian Status & Data Source Status

Between reviewing the heatmap and building scenarios, you triage the population by assigning statuses. There are two status tracks — one for people, one for data sources — and both draw their available values from a list your administrator configures for the matter.

Custodian Status

The Custodian Status section (titled Assign Status) lists every ranked custodian in the matter — name, custodian rank, department, job title, and location — with a status dropdown on the right of each row.

Only custodians with a rank of 1–4 appear here. Set a status one row at a time from the row dropdown, or set a master value at the top of the column and use Update All to apply it to every row currently shown (rows hidden by a filter or by the Include Non-Custodial toggle are not affected — you are asked to confirm first). The clipboard icon at the start of a row opens a read-only view of that custodian's ranking-assessment questions and answers, so you can see why they were ranked as they were.

The default Custodian Status values are:

Data Source Status

The Data Source Status section (titled Assign Status / Create Scenarios) is where per-source triage and scenario building happen together. Rows are grouped by custodian, and under each custodian you see every data source: item number, data-source name, category, type, data-source rank, and classification.

Classification tells you how the source is tied to people:

• Custodial — belongs to a single custodian.
• Group / Shared — a shared source associated with a custodian group.
• Non-Custodial — an organizational source not tied to a person; ranked directly on the source.

The Data Source Status dropdown on each row carries two kinds of value, shown in separate groups:

• Data Source Status Values — the matter-configured statuses your administrator maintains.
• Collection Methods — the collection methods allowed for that source's category. Choosing a method records how the source would be collected.

A green Preserved badge marks any source already under a legal hold, so you can tell at a glance what is protected before you scope collection. As with custodians, you can set a master value at the top and apply it with Update Group (all sources under one custodian) or Update All (every source shown). A collection method only appears in the master picker when every affected source's category allows it.

Scenario modeling

A scenario is a named, saved collection of data sources — a "what if we collected these?" set that you can cost, chart, compare, and ultimately approve. Scenarios let you model several collection scopes side by side (for example, a narrow "key custodians only" scenario against a broader one) before committing to any of them. Nothing in a scenario is collected until you approve it.

You build scenarios on the Data Source Status page using its right-hand Scenario column. First you create (or select) an active scenario, then you check data-source rows into it.

Once a scenario is active, its name shows in the Scenario column header and each row gains a checkbox. Checking a row adds that data source to the active scenario; unchecking removes it. An All checkbox at the top of the column adds or removes every row currently shown at once.

Scenario Approval

The Scenario Approval section (titled Approve Data Sources For Collection) is where you review each scenario in full and commit the sources you want to collect. Every scenario appears as a card with its own data-source table, a running cost summary, and an Approve button.

The Approved checkboxes stage locally — checking and unchecking them updates the counts and the cost footer immediately, but nothing is committed until you click Approve. The footer is the proportionality scorecard: it shows how many data sources the scenario covers, what percentage of the matter's total custodians and data sources that represents, and the Low/Medium/High cost split for All sources in the scenario, the Approved (checked) subset, and the Remaining difference.

From the card header you can also Delete the scenario (this removes the scenario and its assignments but leaves the underlying evidence items in the matter), Print a PDF (choose a Heat Map, a Detailed Report table, or both), export to Excel, or open Chart Scenario to see the heatmap filled with only this scenario's sources.

Approved List

The Approved List section (titled Approved Data Sources) is the read-out of everything you've approved across all scenarios — the defensible collection scope for the matter in one place. Use it as the working list for collection and as a record of what was approved and why.

The list groups approved sources under a folder header for each scenario. For every source it shows the custodian and their rank and status, the item number, the data source's name, category, type, rank, and status, and the three cost estimates. Only qualifying custodians appear — those with an assessment rank and a Custodian Status other than Pending.

You can sort and filter every column, adjust which columns show, and export the list with Print to PDF or Excel. When the list is grouped by scenario, the PDF breaks into a section per scenario so the export mirrors what you see on screen.

6 · Data Sources Module

A data source is any place a custodian's potentially relevant information lives — a laptop, a mailbox, a shared drive, a cloud account, a box of paper. The Data Sources module is where your team catalogs those sources against a matter, tracks each one through preservation and collection, and records the standard chain-of-custody detail that stands up in a discovery dispute. Every data source that has been acted on for a matter is backed by an evidence item, so the list you see here is also your evidence inventory for the matter.

Open a matter and choose Data Sources from the matter navigation. The page opens on a table of every source in scope for the matter, with an All / Custodial / Non-Custodial toggle, per-column search and sort, a configurable column set, and export to Excel or PDF. Click any row to open that source's detail page.

Adding data sources

Most data sources arrive automatically — captured during a custodian's survey or interview, or imported with your employee data. You can also add a source by hand at any time. Use the Add Data Source button at the top of the Data Sources list. The modal always begins by asking which custodian or custodians the source belongs to, then offers two paths:

• Existing Data Source — pick from sources already known in your instance and linked to a custodian on this matter. Search and sort by name, category, type, or classification, then click Add on the row.
• New Data Source — capture a brand-new source. Choose its category, optionally a type, give it a name, and fill in whatever standard and custom fields the category enables. Before it is created, the platform runs a near-duplicate check against your instance so you can reuse an existing source instead of creating a second copy of the same laptop or mailbox.

Either path links the source to the selected custodian(s) and records it on the matter. A source can be custodial (owned by one custodian), group (shared by several, such as a Microsoft Team), or non-custodial (belongs to the matter rather than a person).

Data source details

Clicking a row opens the data source detail page. The left panel shows the source's identity and editable fields; the right panel is a set of tabs that carry the source through its lifecycle. Use the Prev / Next arrows in the header to page through the same filtered, sorted list you came from without returning to the table.

The left panel holds a set of read-only identity fields — Data Source Item Number, Type, Category, Classification, Linked Custodians, and URL — that are locked after creation because downstream workflows key off them. Below those sit the editable fields: Data Source Name plus whatever standard fields (Description, Serial Number, Path, Location, and so on) and custom fields the category enables. Edits are saved with the teal Save Changes button and every change is written to the audit log.

The right panel presents six tabs:

Standard tracking information

Every data source carries the same core tracking information regardless of category, so a report on any matter reads consistently. At the item level this includes the Item Number, Custodian Name(s), Data Source Name, Category, Type, Classification, Data Source Rank, Approval Status, Data Source Status, Preservation Status, Collection Status, and the Date/Time Collected.

The Preservation tab captures how and when the source was held:

• Preservation Type — In Place (held where it lives) or Internal / External Storage (moved to a preservation store). The two are mutually exclusive.
• Date Requested and Requested By — stamped when the preservation request goes out (read-only).
• Date Completed and Preserved By — when and by whom the hold was finalized.
• Technical detail: Path / Location, Scope of Hold, Data Type, Hash, Data Size, and Encrypted (with Encryption Details when encrypted).
• Notes — always editable.

The Collection tab captures the collection itself — Date Requested, Requested By, Date/Time Completed, and Collected By — and, when you check Forensic Collection, an extra block for Data Size, MD5 and SHA1 hashes, and the destination media's Media Type, Interface Type, Make, Model, and Serial #. Media, interface, and make dropdowns are fed by your instance value lists.

Data Source Categories

Every source belongs to one of ten categories. The category determines which standard fields appear, which types are offered, and — importantly — which preservation and collection methods are available for that source. Your instance administrator configures the fields and allowed methods per category; the ten categories themselves are fixed.

Preservation & collection methods

Preservation and collection each run through a method — the methodology picker on the Preservation and Collection tabs (and in the batch preserve modal). The method you choose is the single most important decision for a source, because it decides what the platform actually does. Only the methods your instance administrator has allowed for the source's category appear in the picker; when a category allows exactly one method it shows as a fixed label rather than a dropdown.

Methods fall into three groups:

The distinction that matters: an integration method is fully automated — the platform reaches into Microsoft 365, Google, Box, Dropbox, or Zoom, applies the hold or pulls the collection, and updates the status without anyone touching it. A data-steward or manual method instead records the source as pending and notifies a person; the actual work happens outside the platform, and an administrator marks the item preserved or collected once it is done. A pending manual preservation can be nudged with the Remind action on the Preservation list.

On Evolve (legal hold) matters you drive preservation straight from the Data Sources list: set a row's Approval Status to Approved, pick a Preservation Method, and click the Approve button under the column to start it. On other matters, use the Add Data Source button on the dedicated Preservation page, which walks you through selecting sources and confirming their methods in one batch.

7 · Reports Module

The Reports module turns the evidence, custodian, and legal-hold data captured across a matter into defensible documents you can share, file, or schedule. You work with three things here: a library of built-in reports that render on demand to PDF or Excel, a custom report builder for reports you design yourself, and the matter dashboard that visualizes the same data as clickable widgets. Every report reads live matter data at the moment you run it, so what you export always reflects the current state of the matter.

The built-in report library

InsightOptix ships 14 built-in reports. Ten are matter-scoped — they summarize an entire matter across all its custodians and data sources. The other four are per-custodian deep-dives — you pick one custodian and the report assembles a detailed dossier for that person. You reach the library from the Reports page inside any matter; the deep-dives prompt you to choose a custodian before they run.

Matter-scoped reports (10) — one document covering the whole matter:

Per-custodian deep-dives (4) — pick a custodian, get a dossier:

Running & exporting a report

Running a built-in report is a two-step choice: pick the report, then pick the format. Matter-scoped reports run as soon as you select a format. Deep-dives ask you to choose a custodian first. Reports are generated server-side and stream back as a downloadable file — nothing is stored on your machine until you save it.

Two export formats are available from the library:

• PDF — a formatted, print-ready document with the InsightOptix cover and branding. Use this for filings, review with counsel, and anything you want to look finished.
• Excel — the same content as data rows in a spreadsheet. Use this when you want to sort, filter, pivot, or hand the numbers to another tool.

Custom reports

When no built-in report matches what you need, build your own. The custom report builder lets you assemble a report from a catalog of available fields, name it, and save it to the matter's Reports page alongside the built-ins. Saved custom reports run and export exactly like built-in ones.

Each custom report carries a visibility setting:

• Public — everyone with access to the matter can see and run the report.
• Private — the report is visible only to you, the creator. No one else sees it in the library.

Beyond building and saving, you can:

• Duplicate an existing report to use it as a starting point, then adjust the copy without touching the original.
• Schedule delivery so the report runs automatically on a recurring basis and is sent out without anyone having to open the app.

Matter dashboards

Every matter has a dashboard that presents its key numbers as visual widgets — counts, status breakdowns, and charts drawn from the same data the reports use. The dashboard is the fastest way to read a matter at a glance without running a document.

The widgets are more than pictures: they are clickable. Selecting a slice, bar, or count drills through to a filtered list of exactly the records behind that number. For example, clicking the outstanding-acknowledgment segment takes you to the list of custodians who still owe an acknowledgment, where you can act on them in bulk. The count on the widget and the length of the list you land on always agree, because both are built from the same underlying filter.

8 · Appendix

Appendix A — Access, Tips & Support

• Browser. InsightOptix runs in any current web browser — no software to install.
• Empty lists after login? Your account is active but hasn't been granted matter access yet. Contact your administrator.
• Screens look different from a screenshot? What you see depends on your role and the matter's tier; some controls are visible only to administrators or only on Full matters.

Appendix B — Glossary

Full glossary and the platform Rules appendix to be carried over from the current manual during the QA pass.