gengenbach-forensic-workflows-2012

However, their work also demonstrates the stubborn resilience of data that is written to a
hard drive, outlining the various strategies implemented in recovering “lost” data. 40 The
paradoxical fragility and durability of digital information is highlighted by Simson
Garfinkel and Abhi Shelat in “Remembrance of Data Passed: A Study of Disk Sanitation
Practices,” in which the authors reveal that an astonishing amount of information may
still be available on hard drives improperly sanitized by their previous owners. 41
Jeff Rothenberg also explores the nature of digital information in “Ensuring the
Longevity of Digital Information,” another 1999 study. Rothenberg lays out obstacles to
digital preservation through a hypothetical scenario involving a compact disc encountered
by his grandchildren: “They must not only be able to extract the content on the disc—
they must also interpret it correctly.” 42 Rothenberg argues that digital preservation efforts
must be based around the bitstream—literally, the linear bit-by-bit stream of information
on a storage medium 43 —but also notes that any preservation activity must support the
processes and programs necessary to interpret those ones and zeros properly as a digital
object. 44 This is because “a document file is not a document in its own right: it merely
describes a document that comes into existence only when the file is 'run' by the program
that created it.” 45 The interactions between digital objects described by Rothenberg are
(accessed June 2012). The components and operation of a “spinning disk” hard drive are also
explained in great detail in Kirschenbaum, Mechanisms, 86-96; and Ron White, How Computers Work.
Timothy Edward Downs, illus. 9 th edition (Indianapolis, IN: Que Publishing, 2008), 158-171.
40
Ross and Gow, Digital Archaeology, 17-26.
41
Simson Garfinkel and Abhi Shelat, “Remembrance of Data Passed: A Study of Disk Sanitation Practices,”
IEEE Security and Privacy (January/February 2003), 17-27,
http://cdn.computerscience1.net/2005/fall/lectures/8/articles8.pdf (accessed August 2012).
42
Rothenberg, “Ensuring the Longevity of Digital Information,” 2.
43
The writing of bits onto a storage media to create the bitstream is described in depth in White, How
Computers Work, 158-171.
44
Rothenberg, 2.
45
Ibid., 10. For more information on the representational levels of digital objects, see David Levy, Scrolling
Forward: Making Sense of Documents in the Digital World (New York, NY: Arcade Publishing, 2001),
especially Chapter 2, “What Are Documents?” pp. 21-38; and Kenneth Thibodeau, “Overview of
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