Educating for trust
Rapid technological advances are fuelling trust requirements and concerns about public and private sector records alike. To guarantee the reliability and authenticity of records requires a framework of policies, procedures, technologies, and intentional action or intervention by trusted custodians who have the knowledge required for attesting to and ensuring the continuing authenticity of the records. Records professionals have claimed the role of trusted keepers of the authentic record of our times, but how do they earn that trust? To begin, by acquiring competence. In order to define what kind of education would contribute to qualifying records professionals as competent, it is necessary to identify the components of knowledge they require and the role that society at large expects of them. The responsibilities and challenges presented by managing digital records through time are ones that records professionals should not meet in isolation. In order for records to be able to serve as evidence of actions and events, they must be protected as such. Records-related knowledge requirements are being articulated in the related disciplines of archival science and records management, law, digital forensics, and information assurance and cyber-security. The need for interdisciplinary knowledge to understand and manage the complexities of digital records is being realized in new research alliances that foster the development of knowledge that can support the role of trusted keepers of the authentic record of our times. One such alliance is the Digital Records Forensics Project at the University of British Columbia.
trust authenticity digital forensics trusted recordkeeper trustworthiness