Afternoon All,

 

Last week the Daily Telegraph published an open letter signed by ARA (inc. the Chief Archivists Group), the Digital Preservation Coalition and the Information and Records Management Society.   This letter read:

 

“The Prime Minster has committed the Government to an independent inquiry into the coronavirus pandemic (report, July 16)

 

This will require large amounts of evidence, which will be contained almost entirely in digital records - email, text messages, recordings, data sets- created by politicians and their staff, government officials and individuals outside Government, including private contractors.

 

Information about what messages were sent by whom, to whom and when will be recorded as metadata; as will details about the receipt, opening and deletion of messages.  This is essential to establishing the sequence of actions and decisions.  Forensic tools can analyse records, testing their authenticity and ensuring their reliability.  Vital records, erased in error, may yet be recoverable.

 

The quality of the inquiry will be in direct proportion to the quality of the evidence from which it draws.

 

Whilst organisational inertia can sometimes mean that paper records are retained, this is not the case for digital records.  The inquiry will only success if digital records are preserved through deliberate management.

 

For two decades the National Archives and the British Library have made world-leading contributions to the development of digital preservation, but this success has not been widely replicated.  Research shows that barely ne third of archives are equipped to preserve digital  documents. 

 

Digital infrastructure has come of age during the pandemic.  Time alone will tell if digital record-keeping has come of age too.  The evidence thus far is not promising.

 

Only through a renewal of skills and policy and the rapid deployment of emerging capabilities can we ensure that digital loss will not impede the inquiry. As records are lots, so too is the accountability owed to the public.

 

Information about what messages were sent by who, to who and when will be”

 

A full edited version of the letter can be found on each of the ARA, DPC and IRMS websites, e.g. https://www.archives.org.uk/latest-news/815-covid-19-inquiry-digital-by-default.html

 

 

Best wishes

Gary Tuson

Chair, CALGG