Start with the source recording
Use the earliest available recording and preserve its original bytes. Record the container, codec, duration and acquisition context. A messaging-app export, screen recording or re-encoded copy may introduce its own transitions and remove source information that would otherwise help explain a suspected edit.
Locate the interval under question
Listen to the relevant passage in its wider context. Mark the start and end times of the suspected transition and retain audio on both sides. Waveform and frequency views are useful together: a visible change is a place to investigate, rather than an explanation of what caused it.
Compare speaker and background continuity
The splicing screen compares neighbouring speech segments using voice-related similarity and the background noise spectrum. An abrupt change can arise from an edit, a change of speaker, a moving microphone or a new acoustic environment. Keep these possibilities separate when recording the observation.
Check electrical-frequency continuity when present
A detectable mains-hum trace can provide another continuity signal. The platform examines broader and shorter time windows to identify discontinuities in that trace. A recording without a usable hum trace has no result for this method; the absence of the signal does not establish an edit.
Separate listening copies from the source analysis
Noise reduction and gain adjustment can produce a clearer listening copy. Keep that derivative labelled and retain the processing settings. Prepare a forensic draft transcript from the original recording and keep uncertain words visible. An enhancement should not silently replace the source used for continuity checks.
Present timestamps and alternative explanations
Record the exact interval, the observations from each analysis and any disagreement between them. Keep the waveform, frequency view and relevant metadata connected to the source recording. A transition flag is a screening output; it does not by itself establish that content was removed, inserted or rearranged.