Building the Electronic Records Archives

4/26/2004

National Archives and Records Administration

The Nature of Electronic Records

•The nature of electronic records differs from traditional records

•Traditional (hard copy) records

–Inscribed on their media

–Preservation is performed on the object

•Electronic records

–Represented as binary values that must be translated to a different form in order to communicate the record

–It is the result of this reproduction, not the stored bits, that is the electronic record

–It is this ability to reproduce the record that must be preserved

–The preserved re-creation/translation must be authentic

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	•While preserving electronic records serves the same fundamental purpose, the process is substantially different. Traditional records are often terms “hard copy” in that the information that the record contains is inscribed in a hard, indissoluble manner on a physical medium, and the physical inscription conveys the information