Thursday, September 29, 2016

The Field Of Computer Forensics

By Shirley Hayes


The adoption of various kinds of computers in personal, corporate, and government processes is leading to a new form of crime referred to as cybercrime. Cybercrime is any kind of crime facilitated by computers. Cybercrime is growing at a very fast rate, something that is making it necessary to formulate strategies for combating this new threat. In a bid to combat cybercrime, a new field of study known as computer forensics (CF) has emerged worldwide.

Another name for this field of study is computer forensic science. Some of the best specialists in this field are located in Albemarle, NC. Computer forensic science is one of the branches that make up the field of digital forensic science. It is a science that pertains to the evidence that is found on digital storage media and computers. The field entails the practice of collecting, analyzing, and reporting on digital data in a legally admissible manner. It makes use of digitally stored data to detect and prevent crime.

Computer forensic science continues to find more use in new professions. Almost every profession finds CF useful in one way or another. Law enforcement agencies are some examples of bodies that pioneered this field. These agencies make heavy use of this field in various operations. They also stand at the forefront in the major breakthroughs that have been made in CF.

Modern computers are increasingly becoming active crime scenes through the action of criminals and law enforcement officers. A computing device can become a crime scene when it was the target of a denial of service or hacking attack. Computers are also important sources of information in criminal investigations. It may hold information about internet history, emails, and documents, which can be useful in a crime such as a murder.

The scope of CF exceeds finding documents, files, and emails on computing devices. It involves the examination of metadata on documents to reveal more information about them, which could prove to be useful in solving a crime. For example, through the use of metadata, it is possible to identify the first date a document appeared or was created on computers. It is also possible to determine the last date the document was printed, edited, and saved beside identifying the user of who undertook all these operations.

More recently, the employment of CF by commercial organizations has been for organizational benefit. There are several different cases in which CF is employed by commercial organizations. These cases include forgeries, industrial espionage, employment disputes, fraud investigations, and intellectual property theft. Internet use in work-places, inappropriate emails in workplaces, regulatory compliance, and bankruptcy investigations are additional cases handled under this field.

Investigation in this field employs several different techniques. These techniques include cross-drive analysis, stochastic forensics, steganography, live analysis, and deleted files. The correlation of information gathered from multiple hard drives is done under cross-drive analysis.

CF examination is a single process that is comprised of six separate steps. These steps include readiness, presentation, review, collection, evaluation, and analysis. The list above is not in a chronological order. Although very crucial, the readiness step is often overlooked. Legal, administrative, and technical are the three broad categories of issues that prevail in this field.




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