In 2000, as the S.E.C. pored through Andersen's documents, the firm assigned Richard Kutsenda, a partner, to review its policies on document retention.

The firm put Mr. Kutsenda in charge of revising its policy on document retention.

As a result, the number of companies seeking advice on document retention from the Gartner Group has doubled, said Toby Bell, a research director at the firm's Chicago office.

The company said that it had sent employees four e-mail messages on document retention since Oct. 25, most recently last Monday.

Earlier in the case, prosecutors focused on another e-mail message that Ms. Temple sent to Andersen employees that October, this one about the firm's "document retention" policy.

They will also rely on the Oct. 12 e-mail message from the Andersen lawyer reminding its Enron team about the firm's policies on document retention.

Mr. Duncan also said that he destroyed some of his own Enron-related documents in an effort to comply with Andersen's document retention and destruction policies.

How many times in your two years, roughly, at Andersen did you send memos like this, reminding people of the document retention and destruction policy?

In addition, the National Register has written policies of whistleblower protection and document retention.

In conjunction with document retention, another issue is that of the security of storage media and how well electronic documents are protected for both current and future use.