The National Archives Science Working Group has just released a publication developed with a team of archivists, records managers, data managers and scientists in Federal agencies is designed to help Federal agency CIOs, IT program staff and records officers understand what procedures are in place now and what policies and process procedures need to be either updated or developed to ensure that long-term digital information is appropriately managed and preserved.
The document is titled: Establishing Trustworthy Digital Repositories: A Discussion Guide Based on the ISO Open Archival Information System (OAIS) Standard Reference Model.
The ISO stands for the International Organization for Standardization and, as a former long time member of a large Corporation IT department, I’m aware of how important these standards are, especially to Genealogists and Family History researchers. Everyday researchers certainly don’t need to commit it to memory, but it’s always good to have an idea of what’s in it and why it’s important.
Click on the link to the Toolkit for Managing Electronic Records if you’d like to see the document.
You can also learn more about it at the National Archives Records Express Blog.