DFXML File

What are DFXML files and how to open them

Are you having problems opening a DFXML file or are you simply curious about its contents? We're here to explain the properties of these files and provide you with software that can open or handle your DFXML files.

What is a DFXML file?

A .DFXML file is a Digital Forensics XML file.

Digital Forensics XML describes a standardized XML-based format for capturing detailed forensic information about digital media and processing steps taken during investigations. It allows forensic tools to record file system metadata, hashes, timestamps, partition and volume details, disk image locations, and provenance (which tools and environments produced the data) in a machine-readable exchange format. It was developed by Simson Garfinkel and others beginning in 2007, especially for outputs such as those from SleuthKit tools, and has since been adopted by other forensic extractors like fiwalk, bulk_extractor, and hash utilities.

Files are usually generated by forensic tools that walk through disk images or directories (for example, fiwalk), compute file metadata, timestamps (like creation, modification, access), sizes, file contents hashes, and record how and when these were produced. Other tools consume or transform these documents for further analysis, verification, or reporting. The schema is maintained by the DFXML Working Group under NIST; the versioning is explicit in the XML namespace and version attributes.

A typical document starts with an XML declaration and a root element in the namespace "http://www.forensicswiki.org/wiki/Category:Digital_Forensics_XML", containing sections such as metadata, creator (which includes program name, version, build and execution environments), source (e.g. disk image filename), volumes, and file objects. File objects may include elements for name, path, size, allocated status, times (crtime, mtime, ctime), hash digest, and byte runs pointing to where in the image file data is located.

A distinctive identifying signature is that documents begin with "<?xml version=" at the start and include key elements like DFXML, XMLNS, SOURCE, CREATOR, TIME, NAME, TYPE, ELEMENTS, and strings like "PURL.ORG" or "_ENVIRONMENT" somewhere in their contents. These strings help in distinguishing them from generic XML documents.

How to open DFXML files

Important: Different programs may use files with the DFXML file extension for different purposes, so unless you are sure which format your DFXML file is, you may need to try a few different programs.

We have not yet verified any programs for Windows that work with this specific file format. If you know one, please use the 'Suggest a program' link below. Thanks!

Last updated: October 27, 2026

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