Forensic acquisition and analysis of magnetic tapes

Recovering evidential data from magnetic tapes in a forensically sound manner is a difficult task. There are many different tape technologies in existence today and an even greater number of archive formats used. This paper discusses the issues and challenges involved in the forensic acquisition and analysis of magnetic tapes. It identifies areas of slack space on tapes and discusses the challenges of low level acquisition of an entire length of tape. It suggests a basic methodology for determining the contents of a tape, acquiring tape files, and preparing them for forensic analysis.