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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

Unicode 8.0 is now available

June 2015 by Duff Johnson
News


The latest version of the Unicode Standard adds 7,716 new characters and six new scripts. New additions range from emoji characters (including five modifiers for diversity), new ideographs for Chinese, Japanese, and Korean, … Read more

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June 2015 by Duff Johnson
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PDF/A adoption remains slow, even in European academic archives.

News

June 2015 by Duff Johnson
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Will PDF/UA be an option or a requirement for PDF documents in the coming refresh of Section 508? Duff Johnson … Read more

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May 2015 by Duff Johnson
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EU policy-makers reconsider application of WCAG 2.0-based regulations to non-web content.

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May 2015 by Duff Johnson
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The PDF Technical Conference 2015 in San Jose, California this coming October offers a unique collection of developer-oriented resources to … Read more

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May 2015 by Boris Doubrov
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How veraPDF’s purpose-built validation model addresses the challenge of PDF/A validation and opens the door to a generalized model for … Read more

Article

May 2015 by Duff Johnson
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The first set of 49 candidate test suite files has been loaded to veraPDF’s public Github repository.

News

May 2015 by PDF Association staff
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The Document Strategy Forum 2015 is all about electronic documents, but not so much about PDF.

Article

April 2015 by Duff Johnson
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Following 24 hours of teleconference meetings ISO committee delegates and PDF Association members gather in San Jose.

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April 2015 by Duff Johnson
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In essence, Xplor is about doing clever things with PDF files.

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April 2015 by Duff Johnson
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Germany Standards bureau bans lossy JBIG2 compression from use in German federal agencies.

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