Digital Evidence Is Bigger Than Most Cases Realize
copyright Steve Burgess 2026
There’s a scene in television forensics that appears in approximately 94.27% of all episodes.
Someone in a dark room says, “Pull up the computer.”
Then ten seconds later, another person says, “Got it.”
Case solved.
I regret to report that reality remains stubbornly less cooperative.
After decades working with attorneys on digital evidence, one thing still surprises me: how often a case that appears to have “no digital component” turns out to have digital evidence everywhere.
Employment dispute? Texts, cloud storage, metadata.
Partnership disagreement? Shared drives, USB device history, email drafts.
Family matter? Phones, photos, location history, account access. Earlier versions of a not-quite-last will and testament.
Construction case? Documents, revisions, messages, timestamps.
Even the cases that begin with, “There really isn’t any computer evidence…” frequently end with someone saying, “Wait… where did THAT come from?”
Part of the challenge is that people still think of digital evidence as a computer sitting under a desk.
Today it’s usually spread across:
• phones
• cloud services
• messaging apps
• browser history
• backups
• documents
• photos
• notifications
• connected devices
And no, before anyone asks: the answer is usually not “image every device and search for the word fraud.”
The most effective forensic work often starts with a surprisingly boring question:
What are we actually trying to prove, or at least, find indicators of?
Once that’s clear, the evidence universe shrinks dramatically.
I’ve seen attorneys spend tens of thousands collecting data they never needed. Not that I minded the funds, even if my advice to limit the search was ignored.
I’ve also seen tiny overlooked artifacts change the direction of a case.
The point isn’t that every case needs digital forensics.
It’s that nearly every case now has digital evidence somewhere.
Sometimes the trick isn’t finding – it’s realizing it was there all along.
Here’s a question for attorneys: what’s the most unexpected source of evidence you’ve seen show up in discovery?
Let me know and I’ll put it in a future post.
Steve Burgess has been doing digital forensics since 1985 and has examined more than 20,000 devices and pieces of digital evidence. He can be reached at (866) 345-3345 or steve@burgessforensics.com.
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