Adobe's portable document format gets the nod in Scotland, leaving England and Wales the only place in Europe moving towards TIFF and away from a universal legal electronic file standard

While England and Wales delays over deciding an approved or preferred electronic format for documents exchanged within the legal system, Scotland has once again taken the digital initiative.


The Gazette has it on good authority that the decision to make Adobe's PDF format the official preferred electronic document format has already been made behind closed doors.


A formal announcement will be made on the issue later in the summer, while the lawyers involved in the decision-making haggle over the wording. But the Gazette has learned that this wording will, in essence, anoint PDF as the format for document exchange within the Scottish criminal and civil justice system and all major areas of the legal profession.


Bodies such as the courts or the police will still be able to use whatever document formats they wish internally, but they will be required to be able to exchange documents, both into and out of their systems, in an as-yet-undetermined Adobe PDF flavour.


Exactly which version of PDF has not yet been decided, but if the Gazette's recent revelations on the Registers of Scotland's move to issue all Scottish lawyers who want them free digital signature smartcards are any pointer (see [2006] Gazette, 9 March, 5), it will be one capable of being secured with two digital signatures.


James Ness, deputy director of professional practice at the Law Society of Scotland, would only confirm that a meeting took place two weeks ago at its offices of the Court Technology Forum Steering Group. He said: 'All the major areas of the court process were represented, including, in particular, the judiciary, the Court Administration Service, Crown office, Fiscal Service and the police, as well as the society's members... and major issues in relation to the introduction of technology to the court process were discussed and the way forward agreed in principle.' Mr Ness confirmed that the view of the group was that Adobe's PDF was already 'the de facto cross-platform standard'.


The move jumps ahead of England and Wales, which last month inched forward on the issue with the release of part one of the Litigation Support Technology Group's (LiST) data exchange protocol.


But LiST's recommendations were to adopt TIFF rather than PDF. On the continent, it is already widely recognised that a standard such as Adobe, most likely Adobe itself, has to be agreed on for harmony's sake, and many have already moved to back it.


Jonathan Brewer, head of practitioner solutions for LexisNexis, welcomed the Scottish move. 'It's a very interesting development, particularly in the light of the recent LiST recommendation of TIFF as the format for exchange of electronic evidence in England and Wales.'


PDF is a far more versatile and secure format for dealing efficiently with e-documents filed with the courts or produced for disclosure, Mr Brewer said. PDF, he added, is a more comprehensive format that is usable by anyone using software that is free - for example, Adobe's PDF reader, Acrobat.


'The Scottish decision caters for the many that do not have specialist systems, rather than the few that do. From the experience of our... business in the US, the simple conversion of documents to secure, "read-only PDF" has also eliminated legal discussion around the validity of documents, allowing court time to be concentrated on the legal issue in hand,' said Mr Brewer.


Andrew Jones, a litigation professional support lawyer at Clifford Chance and a member of the Association of Litigation Professional Support Lawyers (ALPS), said of the Scottish move: 'ALPS has long championed PDF as the default format for exchange of procedural documents, such as pleadings. However, noting the orientation of many current litigation support systems - and their operators - towards TIFF, we have so far advocated greater flexibility with regard to disclosure documents.'