A failed case-file server or a fee-earner’s dead laptop is rarely just a storage problem — how the device is handled in the first hour decides whether what comes back can be relied on later. Practices and chambers across Cambridgeshire send us both kinds of job: straightforward recovery where speed is what matters, and forensically sound acquisition where it may be tested. Worked in-house, under NDA, with custody logged where it counts.
Matter files, practice databases and departing-employee machines — NDA as standard, one named contact, custody records where findings may be challenged, and nothing leaving the UK.
The two jobs use overlapping techniques and quite different handling, and the choice has to be made before anything is touched.
The Essex legal and administrative cluster produces the highest proportion of evidential requests in our catchment, and Bury St Edmunds and Cambridge add practice work on top of it. Case management systems, land and estate records, and archives held under statutory retention are the bulk of it.
Much of that material is old by the time anyone needs it, which is the point of retention. Recovery from genuinely aged media — tape, optical, pre-SATA drives — is routine rather than exceptional on this class of work.
Where material is privileged, that has to be preserved through the recovery rather than acknowledged afterwards. Work stays in-house, nothing is subcontracted, no data leaves the UK, and one named engineer handles the job throughout so the number of people with access is as small as it can be.
We will sign practice-specific confidentiality terms before the media arrives, and where a matter requires it we can provide a statement in the form courts accept. We will also say plainly in advance whether the material is likely to support the conclusions you are hoping for, which is more useful than optimism.
Say so before anything is touched. Handling it correctly from the first hour is not something that can be applied retrospectively, and it is the difference between findings that survive challenge and findings that do not.
Often which account, rarely which person, and never what they intended. We report what the records show. Any expert offering more is exceeding what the evidence supports.
A common instruction and frequently answerable. USB connection records, file access timestamps and cloud sync artefacts are all examinable. Secure the machine and stop anyone using it.
That is the point of the method. Write-blocked acquisition, hash verification, documented custody and a report stating methodology and limitations. Whether it persuades is for the tribunal.
Routine on this work. Tape, optical and pre-SATA drives all come in from practices with long retention obligations. Send a photograph first if you are unsure what you are holding.
Recovery from £300 +VAT for a single machine. Evidential work is quoted individually after a scoping conversation, as a fixed figure before work begins.