Deleted messages, financial records and files may be very important in divorce and family cases; however, they are only of value if lawfully acquired. We examine devices that belong to you, or jointly to you and your spouse, or work at your solicitor's request, for clients across Staines and Surrey. Free diagnostic and freephone advice available.
Confidentiality and quality of evidence. Every case starts with a free diagnostic and a written scope prior to conducting the investigation.
These are the situations in divorce and family proceedings across Staines and Surrey where a lawful forensic examination can help, always on a device you are entitled to examine.
Matrimonial forensic investigations depend on answering one primary question: are you entitled to access the device? We work on three lawful bases and nothing else: the device is genuinely yours alone, it is something you jointly own with your spouse (e.g. a home computer or backup hard drive), or the matter has been instructed through your solicitor or directed by the court. What we will never do is covertly access your spouse's private phone, personal laptop or private account, regardless of how suspicious the situation may appear. Accessing another person's device without authority is a criminal offence under the Computer Misuse Act 1990, intercepting their private messages is unlawful, and evidence obtained this way is very likely to be ruled inadmissible and could ultimately harm the person who gathered it. Doing things the right way helps protect your case, as well as yourself.
A great deal can be recovered from a device you are entitled to examine. Most commonly that means deleted text messages, WhatsApp and iMessage chat histories, emails, documents, spreadsheets and photographs, along with web-browsing and search history and the file timestamps showing when each item was created, opened or deleted. In financial-disclosure disputes this often means reconstructing statements, transfers and accounting records that point to undeclared income or assets, the kind of paper trail that matters when the figures on a Form E do not add up.
The cleanest way to get this done is usually through your solicitor. We can be instructed by one party or, very commonly in family proceedings, as a single joint expert acting for both parties: the agreed device is imaged, we examine only what the court has permitted, and we produce an unbiased report. Our overriding duty is to the court, not to the person paying the bill. The report is prepared to be read by a judge, with a technical appendix behind it, and it honestly sets out how we worked, what we found and where the limits lie. It's precisely this even-handedness that makes the evidence usable.
If the device is yours or jointly owned, the best course of action is to stop using it and turn it off. Don't use 'recovery' apps from an app store, don't allow anyone to take a quick look at it, and don't delete or move anything just to make it neat and tidy, because each of those things could overwrite the deleted files you're trying to recover, or muddle the timeline. Contact us in Staines and Surrey via the freephone number, or ask your solicitor to instruct us, and we'll deal with it from there.
Matrimonial work is included within our wider forensic data recovery services; the hub outlines the evidence-grade methodology that underpins every examination.
From a device which you own or co-own with someone else (or one the court has ordered to be inspected), these are the categories we recover most frequently.
Deleted SMS, WhatsApp, iMessage and app chat logs.
Deleted emails, letters, spreadsheets and PDFs.
Deleted images and the dates embedded in them.
The history of browsing, searches and account activity on each device over time.
Statements, transfers and account files related to disclosure.
When was a file created, opened, changed or deleted?
We do not covertly access a partner's private phone, laptop, email or social-media accounts, regardless of how strong the suspicion or how much confidence you have about what may exist there. Unauthorised access would breach the Computer Misuse Act 1990, intercepting private communications is unlawful, and evidence obtained this way is usually ruled inadmissible and could open up potential claims against you. As such, we only work on your own devices, genuinely jointly-owned assets, or matters formally instructed via your solicitor or the family court: the lawful route that actually helps your case.
Any matrimonial case must be dealt with lawfully and preserved carefully, so please call 0800 689 0668 or have your solicitor contact us before sending anything. We will confirm the lawful basis, agree which drives to send (the drives, not the machines) and document the chain of custody from the time they arrive at our secure location in Guildford.
Sending a drive from a computer, laptop, MacBook, iMac, CCTV/DVR or server? You will need to remove the internal hard drive or SSD and send us just the drive, as we are unable to remove the drive for you. We also cannot recover storage soldered onto a motherboard, such as in Apple Silicon Macs and some thin laptops. Only drives that can be removed from a machine and sent to us can be recovered. If you are unsure whether your device has a removable drive, please call us before sending. RAID, server and SAN drives need to be removed from their enclosure and labelled by bay. For a NAS, send the disks themselves if they are removable, otherwise the entire NAS device. An external single drive should come to us whole, along with its cable and power supply.
↓ Print the booking-in & shipping form (PDF)
Please mark the package for the attention of Guildford Data Recovery, and we will call you as soon as we have diagnosed your media.
Unsure as to how to proceed with sending the item in for recovery? Then simply call 0800 689 0668, or complete the free online diagnostic prior to dispatching the item to obtain your price quotation.
Contact us, or have your solicitor instruct us, for a lawful, court-ready examination. Free diagnostic and freephone advice.