Protecting Your Digital Records

1
Protecting Your Digital Records
________________________

• Christian Skipper
• Appraisal Archivist
• Maryland State Archives

2
Common Digital Records

• Photographs
• Email
• Word Documents
• Family Histories
• Financial Records
• Music
• Video

3
Consider Scope

1. Permanent
2. Non-Permanent

4
Scope Permanent

• Duplication of form
• Must be able to upgrade in the future
• Examples
• Photographs
• Family videos
• Diplomas
• Scanning Specs
• Full Color
• Up to 600dpi
• Archival Formats

5
Scope Non-Permanent

• Content is more important than appearance
• Will not need to upgrade
• Examples
• Tax filings
• Contracts
• Leases
• Scanning Specs
• 200dpi
• Greyscale or Black and White
• Not necessarily archival formats

6
File Formats

• Photographs TIFF, JPEG
• Video MOV
• Audio WAV, FLAC, SHN
• Text PDF, PDF/A, TXT
• Email EML, TXT, PDF

7
Software

• Scanning
• Do not spend too much money consider open-source
• Consider exportability
• General rule do not depend on complex management
  software

8
Avoiding the Crash

• Do not keep all of your records in one place
• Consider a portable hard drive
• Keep your copies identical
• Back-up regularly