IN RE DIDI GLOBAL INC. SECURITIES LITIGATION

Background

The provided document is a letter from plaintiffs’ counsel requesting an order compelling DiDi Global Inc. to correct its production of instant messages. Plaintiffs said DiDi produced each message as a separate two-page document, rather than presenting related messages together in a chronological, conversation-like format. According to plaintiffs, this format separated messages from their context and made them difficult to review and use as evidence.

Plaintiffs also challenged DiDi’s redactions of the identities of non-DiDi participants in the chats. Plaintiffs said the redacted people included employees of underwriters, lawyers, and accountants working on the initial public offering. They argued that DiDi had identified the participants in a master list and could provide their names while redacting other private information if necessary. Plaintiffs further relied on the parties’ discovery protocol and protective order.

Parties’ positions

Plaintiffs argued that Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 34 requires documents to be produced in the form in which they are ordinarily maintained or in another reasonably usable form. They contended that DiDi’s separate-message production did not meet that requirement and that the discovery protocol required information that would associate messages from the same chat.

Plaintiffs also argued that DiDi could not redact otherwise relevant information based on relevance or privacy concerns without using the procedures provided by the discovery protocol. Plaintiffs requested that DiDi reproduce the messages in a coherent conversation, sequential, or chain format and remove redactions identifying people working on the deal, or provide an overlay with those individuals’ names.

The document states that DiDi responded that it could not provide a file associating texts from the same conversation and described some redacted information as identification numbers and personal aliases. The provided text does not include a separate response from DiDi to the motion or letter beyond the responses described by plaintiffs.

Court’s discussion and disposition

The document contains legal reasoning supporting plaintiffs’ request, including the statement that DiDi’s messages were not in a reasonably usable form and that unilateral redactions based on relevance were not permitted. It also cites the protective order as a reason privacy concerns could be addressed without redacting the information from the documents.

However, the provided text is principally plaintiffs’ submission and does not clearly state an operative ruling. It includes a “SO ORDERED” notation associated with Judge Lewis A. Kaplan, but the text supplied here does not say whether the motion was granted, denied, or granted in part and denied in part. The date supplied in the case metadata is June 26, 2025, while the document itself displays a June 23, 2025 filing date.