Electronic Records Archives – the 2015 concept

Abstract

There is no doubt, that electronic records are used more and more widely in organisation units, and informatisation of administration since 2005 has been providing growing number of tools enabling electronic communication. Being ready to collect electronic records and to manage them in historical archives is a challenge not only for archival authorities, but also for state archives and creators of archival materials. The latter, according to legal regulations, must pass these records on to territorially competent state archives 10 years after creating these records. Thus, the problem of managing electronic records in state archives is one of more urgent. This article aims at describing the problem of managing electronic records using an ICT system. In Poland, in order to manage these records, a prototype of the Electronic Records Archives system was built in 2006; it was supposed to be implemented in 2018. Deliberations contained in this article concern the concept of the system presented in 2015. Ultimately, the ERA system is supposed to manage, i.e. collect, store, arrange and describe, and provide access to electronic archival materials. In this context, its analysis has been made, regarding especially the process of passing on electronic records to state archives. The text presents the up-to-date legal status, state of the art, as well as own reflections of the Author; on the ground of world research on digital archives, the analysis allowed indicating elements of the system, that, according to the Author, need special engagement from experts during the designing stage.