Insights

When the date and time decide the case.

Reporting and analysis on video, time, and the record. The cases where a timestamp changed the outcome, how courts decide whether footage can be trusted, and what it takes to make your date and time hold up when it counts.

What Texas law says about your video's timestamp

Texas courts have already ruled that a date and time stamp helps authenticate a video. What Fowler v. State and Rule 901 mean for anyone relying on footage in Texas.

Read article →

When the clock is the evidence

Why a video's timestamp can decide a case, and what a wrong or unverifiable one can cost. How courts treat the date and time on footage, why most camera clocks are wrong, and what that means for anyone relying on video.

Read article →

Provenance, AI video, and why the original file still wins

Provenance standards and AI-generated video are reshaping how we trust footage. Through all of it, the original file with intact metadata remains the thing that holds up.

Read article →

Body-worn cameras and the timestamp problem

Body-worn cameras generate mountains of footage, and a single mis-synced clock can undermine a timeline. Why BWC evidence lives or dies on its timestamp.

Read article →

What a defensible timestamp looks like in a deposition

It is one thing to print a date on a video. It is another to defend it under questioning. What separates a timestamp that survives a deposition from one that does not.

Read article →

Metadata stripping: how a re-exported video loses its proof

Re-saving or texting a clip feels harmless, but it can strip the very metadata that proves when the video was shot. Why only the original file holds its proof.

Read article →

The doorbell that testifies: consumer camera evidence

Doorbell and consumer security cameras now supply a flood of video evidence. Convenient, persuasive, and quietly prone to the same timestamp problems as any camera.

Read article →

Content provenance and the deepfake era

AI can fabricate convincing video. Provenance standards like C2PA try to prove what is real, but they are not a deepfake detector. Where that leaves your footage.

Read article →

Self-authenticating video under FRE 902(14)

A 2017 change to the Federal Rules lets digital video authenticate itself through a hash value. What FRE 902(14) means for footage headed to court.

Read article →

Dashcams as witnesses: what the footage must prove

In trucking, drivers call their cameras witnesses. What a dashcam clip actually has to prove before a court will treat it like one.

Read article →

When a wrong timestamp gets surveillance footage excluded

An unexplained timestamp does not just weaken footage, it can keep it out. How a wrong clock turns useful surveillance video into a liability.

Read article →

The daylight saving time trap in timestamped footage

Twice a year the clocks change and half the cameras do not. Why daylight saving time is a recurring trap for video evidence.

Read article →

Chain of custody for digital video, explained

Who touched the file, and how do you prove it was not altered? A plain-language guide to chain of custody, hash values, and self-authenticating digital video.

Read article →

Why most camera clocks are wrong

More than half of security cameras are reportedly set to the wrong time. Why clocks drift, and why a one-hour error can quietly sink a case.

Read article →

How courts decide whether a video can be trusted

Footage is not evidence until it is authenticated. A plain-language look at the rules that decide whether a video, and its date and time, make it in front of a jury.

Read article →