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A case study in PDF forensics: The Epstein PDFs

This article details a PDF forensics case study on a small, random selection of the Epstein PDF files released by the US Department of Justice (DoJ). The tranche contains 4,085 PDF files, with an estimated 5,879 remaining unreleased. Key findings include:

  • A difference in PDF version reporting between forensic tools.
  • The presence of two incremental updates.
  • The discovery of a hidden (orphaned) document information dictionary revealing the software used in processing.
  • The DoJ avoided JPEG images to prevent metadata leakage.
  • Overall, the DoJ’s sanitization workflow could be improved to reduce file size and information leakage.
Peter Wyatt

By Peter Wyatt
December 2025

A case study in PDF forensics: The Epstein PDFs

This article details a PDF forensics case study on a small, random selection of the Epstein PDF files released by the US Department of Justice (DoJ). The tranche contains 4,085 PDF files, with an estimated 5,879 remaining unreleased. Key findings include:

  • A difference in PDF version reporting between forensic tools.
  • The presence of two incremental updates.
  • The discovery of a hidden (orphaned) document information dictionary revealing the software used in processing.
  • The DoJ avoided JPEG images to prevent metadata leakage.
  • Overall, the DoJ’s sanitization workflow could be improved to reduce file size and information leakage.
Peter Wyatt

By Peter Wyatt
December 2025

PDF: the de facto document technology

July 2017 by PDF Association staff
Article


The Portable Document Format (commonly known as “PDF”) is a file format developed in the early 1990s as a way to share computer documents, including text formatting and inline images.

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July 2017 by PDF 2.0 interops help vendors

The PDF 2.0 interop workshops included many vendors with products for creating, editing and processing PDF files. They came together … Read more

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June 2017 by PDF Association staff
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2017 marks a record number of attendees / Experts shared fully-grounded wisdom on PDF standards across the two-day event Berlin. … Read more

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May 2017 by Andrew Bailes-Collins
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by Andrew Bailes-Collins Where do all these different flavors of PDF/X fit, and for anybody wanting to use PDF/X, which … Read more

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May 2017 by Andrew Bailes-Collins
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by Andrew Bailes-Collins PDF/X Tools The good news for anybody wishing to start working with PDF/X standards, is that there … Read more

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May 2017 by Stephan Jaeggi
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by Stephan Jaeggi PDF/X only defines the general requirements for a reliable exchange of prepress data; the ISO standard itself … Read more

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May 2017 by Dietrich von Seggern
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by Dietrich von Seggern Specialized ISO standards based on the Portable Document Format are available for a wide range of … Read more

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May 2017 by Dietrich von Seggern
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by Dietrich von Seggern PDF/X was the first ISO standard based on PDF technology. A subset of the PDF specification, … Read more

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May 2017 by Peter De Bruyne
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Even as the first part of PDF/X was published as ISO 15930-1 in 2001, others were already in development. PDF/X … Read more

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May 2017 by Dietrich von Seggern
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PDF/X is a subset of PDF – see “Technical side and requirements of PDF/X” for an overview. As such, conforming … Read more

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March 2017 by PDF Association staff
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How will the PDF 2.0 interop workshops work? This article explains the process of building the test-matrix to establish possibilities … Read more

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