Under French law, all communications on any medium between an external attorney and their client are covered by attorney-client privilege, pursuant to the National Regulation of the Lawyer's Profession, Law No. 71-1130 of 31 December 1971, the Privacy Decree of 20 October 2005, and the Preliminary Article of the French Code of Criminal Procedure as amended by Law No. 2021-2129 of 22 December 2021. Thus, French law protects, as being confidential, communications between lawyers and clients as well as communications between lawyers, together with any documents attached to the said communications.

With regard to communications between lawyers and clients, privileged documents include the following:

• Legal opinions drafted by the lawyer and transmitted or to be transmitted to the client
• Communications between the client and their lawyer(s)
• Meeting notes
• All documents included in the lawyer's file (e.g., notes taken by a lawyer to prepare the client's defense even if not yet transmitted to the client)

Law No. 2021-1729 dated 22 December 2021 introduced new provisions regarding legal privilege. For certain tax and criminal investigations, French law operates a distinction between legal advice privilege and litigation privilege. While litigation privilege is always protected, legal advice privilege is not protected when (i) the investigation pertains to tax fraud, corruption, influence peddling, terrorism financing and money laundering offenses, and (ii) the legal opinions, correspondence or exhibits that are in possession of, or were communicated by, the lawyer or the client were used for committing or facilitating the commission of said offenses. This exception applies to materials that were not prepared in the context of a litigation proceedings and is strictly controlled; a judge makes the final determination as to which materials can be disclosed.

The other exclusion to the protection relates to the disclosure of privileged materials that is necessary for the proper defense of a lawyer who is personally suspected and/or prosecuted as perpetrator or accomplice of a criminal offense or within the context of a disciplinary procedure.

The privilege protecting communications between lawyers is even broader than the privilege protecting communications between a lawyer and a client. Pursuant to the National Regulation of the Lawyer's Profession, all communications between lawyers are by nature confidential and therefore cannot be produced in court.

Communications between lawyers are privileged unless stamped "official" or considered to be procedural acts. Even if stamped "official," a communication between lawyers should not be disclosed to a third party if it refers to discussions or documents that are privileged. Such a communication would itself be considered as privileged under French law.

Communications between a French lawyer (i.e., a lawyer admitted to a French bar association) and a foreign lawyer are also deemed privileged, irrespective of the foreign rules on privilege applicable to the foreign lawyer, if they are included in the file of the French lawyer.