From Paper Fibers to Content Streams: Evolving FDE Methodology for the Digital Era
In this feature for The Examiner, the quarterly publication of SAFE, forensic document examiner Ron Lawrence describes how a presentation by Celeste Makoff of DeepData Forensics on PDF “deep metadata” changed how he thinks about questioned documents.
He argues that as more disputed documents arrive as digital files rather than paper, examiners need to look beneath the visible page, at a file's software information, timestamps, modification history, embedded objects, and internal structure.
“I recently attended a presentation by Celeste Makoff of DeepData Forensics on the examination of PDF ‘deep metadata.’ Her presentation was, for me, an absolute wake-up call.”
Ron Lawrence, FHDE, The Examiner, Q3 2026
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