Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
ensure. all. affected. people. in. the. organization. understand.
their.responsibilities.for.preserving.the.integrity.of.any.poten-
tially.relevant.electronic.evidence.should.there.be.any.indica-
tion.of.a.possible.court.action..We.discuss.litigation.holds.in.
more.detail.in.Chapter.6.
5.5 MARKING TIME—HOW TIME IS
RECORDED AND ENSURING INTEGRITY
As.noted. in.the.last.section,. the.time.and.date.information.
included. in. or. about. an. important. piece. of. electronic. data.
can. often. be. the. crux. of. a. matter. when. trying. to. establish.
what.happened.when.and.to.whom..In.this.section.we.spend.
a.little.more.time.considering.time.(Figure 5.6).
Modern.computing.devices.operate.in.cycles.of.time.that.
are.tiny.compared.to.what.we.are.normally.aware.of..They.
operate.in.and.record.those.operations.in.milliseconds.(one.
thousandth.of.a.second)..This.was.not.always.the.case..Some.
of.the.irst.computers.did.not.bother.tracking.or.recording.the.
time.of.day,.but.they.still.operated.in.timed.cycles.that.they.
did.track.
Tracking. the. time. is. done. in. different. ways. by. different.
operating.systems..Microsoft.operating.systems.track.time.on.
Figure 5.6 Time.is.of.the.essence—the.question.of.when.something.
happened.can.be.one.of.the.most.important.facts.to.establish.
