US Patent 8452741 Reconciling data retention requirements

Data retention requirement rules may be created to have an area association, a minimum retention period specification, and a maximum retention period specification associated with one or more rules. Users may be assigned to one or more areas of at least one rule. Data objects may associated with one or more areas that may be associated with a rule. As the rules are updated and/or changed, the minimum and maximum periods in different rules may be compared in real time to implement a data retention policy that automatically deletes, preserves, and/or prevents access to data objects according to the each of the rules.