Tools of the Trade
The digital excavator does not use a trowel; they use hex editors and flux readers. The goal is to move from the physical layer to the logical layer without destroying the artifact.
- Disk Imaging: The first step is always to create a "forensic image"—a bit-for-bit copy of the drive. We never work on the original artifact (the "Find"). We work on the clone to prevent accidental writes.
- File Carving: When the file system (the map) is destroyed, we use "Carving" to sift through the raw binary "dirt." Tools look for file headers (signatures)—like finding a pottery sherd by its shape in a pile of mud.
- Flux Reading: For magnetic media (floppy disks) that are demagnetizing, we read the raw magnetic flux transitions directly, bypassing the drive controller's logic to salvage weak signals.
The Law of Non-Intervention
Just as an archaeologist disturbs the soil to find the bone, digital excavation changes the system. Powering on an old computer changes its timestamps and writes logs. Therefore, the Archaeobytologist prefers "Dead Boot" analysis—reading the storage media externally without waking the machine's operating system.
Field Notes
The "Space Shuttle" Drives: After the Columbia disaster, NASA recovered hard drives from the debris field in Texas. Despite being smashed and burned, forensic experts used "File Carving" and advanced platter reading to recover 99% of the scientific data. This is the gold standard of kinetic excavation.
The "Bit-Rot" Sift: Sometimes we excavate not for files, but for errors. Analyzing a disk image for "bit flips" (random 0s turning to 1s) allows us to map the rate of radioactive decay in the storage medium itself.
Ephemera
In the future, excavation will move from "Magnetic" to "Solid State." Recovering data from a locked, encrypted iPhone with a fried chip is the new frontier—it requires an electron microscope, not just a soldering iron.