---
title: "Checklist: authenticity of digital evidence (messages, recordings, images) and deepfake risk"
url: "https://ailawframework.com/precedents/family-law/digital-evidence-authenticity-checklist"
type: "precedent"
site: "AI Law Framework"
id: "a16-digital-evidence-authenticity-checklist"
area_id: "A16"
kind: "checklist"
ai_level: "yellow"
version: 1
law_stated_as_at: "2026-10-17"
---

# Checklist: authenticity of digital evidence (messages, recordings, images) and deepfake risk

> Checklist for preserving, testing and presenting texts, recordings, photos and videos in family law cases, including AI-generated or altered material, the legality of recordings, and when to brief a forensic expert.

Canonical page: https://ailawframework.com/precedents/family-law/digital-evidence-authenticity-checklist  
Law stated as at: 2026-10-17

Site index for agents: https://ailawframework.com/llms.txt

## Key facts

- Kind: Checklist. Steps or checks to work through and tick off.
- Practice area: [Family Law](https://ailawframework.com/precedents/family-law.md)
- Jurisdictions: Australia, Commonwealth, New South Wales
- AI level: Yellow. AI can help in set ways. A lawyer checks specific points before use.
- Law stated as at: 2026-10-17
- Status: Maintained. Checked on 2026-10-17 against the 6 authorities it cites, for Australia, Commonwealth and New South Wales.

## When to use it

Use when a client gives you digital material to rely on, or when the other party relies on material your client says is fake or altered. Do not use as a substitute for expert forensic analysis where authenticity is genuinely contested.

## How AI may be used

AI forensic tools can flag possible manipulation but are not conclusive and are not evidence by themselves. Contested authenticity needs preserved originals, metadata and, where warranted, an independent expert. Lawyers must never use AI to enhance or alter media.

**AI may:**

- Index exported messages and media by date, sender and source device for the lawyer
- Flag inconsistencies between metadata, content and the client's account for the lawyer to investigate
- Run an approved detection tool as a triage step, recording the tool, version and result

**AI must not:**

- Must not enhance, clean up, transcribe-and-replace or otherwise alter any media relied on as evidence (PD-AI para 4.6(b))
- Must not present a detection tool's score as proof that material is genuine or fake
- Must not upload intimate images or children's images to any AI tool

**The lawyer checks:**

- Originals and devices preserved, with a record of who handled them
- Whether a recording was lawfully made under the relevant state law
- Whether expert evidence is needed and how to raise any allegation of AI misuse with the Court

## Authorities

- [Evidence Act 1995 (Cth) s 48 (proof of contents of documents)](https://www.legislation.gov.au/C2004A04858/latest/text)
- [Evidence Act 1995 (Cth) ss 146, 147 (evidence produced by processes, machines and other devices)](https://www.legislation.gov.au/C2004A04858/latest/text)
- [Evidence Act 1995 (Cth) s 135 (general discretion to exclude evidence)](https://www.legislation.gov.au/C2004A04858/latest/text)
- [Family Law Act 1975 (Cth) ss 102ND, 102NL (rules of evidence not applying in child-related proceedings unless the court decides)](https://www.legislation.gov.au/C2004A00275/latest/text)
- [Surveillance Devices Act 2007 (NSW) s 7 (listening devices; party recording exceptions in s 7(3))](https://legislation.nsw.gov.au/view/html/inforce/current/act-2007-064)
- [Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia, Practice Direction: Use of Artificial Intelligence (PD-AI), paras 4.6(b), 4.12, 4.13, 4.20](https://www.fcfcoa.gov.au/pd/pd-ai)

## Full text and drafting notes

The full text and the drafting notes are not part of this public page. Signed-in firm accounts can read them at https://ailawframework.com/precedents/family-law/digital-evidence-authenticity-checklist and through the signed-in MCP connector https://ailawframework.com/mcp/firm.

*Practice guidance for planning and review. Confirm current primary sources and the requirements of the actual matter. This is general information, not legal advice.*