Forensics and Electronic Discovery in an IoT Era

Over the last several years, e-discovery has broadened in scope. Discovery that was once limited to PDF copies of documents now includes numerous file types, including: emails, presentation files (e.g., PowerPoint), word processing files (e.g., Word), source code files, spreadsheet files (e.g., Excel), and audio and video files, among others. Discovery can also come from numerous types of storage media and devices, including traditional hard disk drives and computers, network storage on servers, USB and card-based memory on cameras and smartphones, and data stored by Internet of Things (IoT) devices such as virtual assistants (e.g., Amazon’s Alexa), fitness wearables (e.g., Fitbit), and home automation technology (e.g., Nest thermostats and Ring doorbells).