Agape Blog

Two years ago a computer forensic program was developed by The Marshall University Forensic Science Center. Sice then the West Virginia State Troopers have been investigating computer crimes with the help of this forensic program. The director of the center said computer evidence is used in cases involving child pornography, embezzlement, drugs and even homicide.

Its a known fact that today computers can be used to perpetrate a crime or contain evidence linked to other types of offenses.  Also, if a computer isn’t actually used to commit the crime, there may still be evidence found on the computer, such as communication records. And this is what is collected by the investigating officers to provide the digital evidence laboratory with the majority of the evidence. Although, some evidence is collected directly at the laboratory,  but majority of the evidence comes from the forensic center.

And the best part since the introduction of this program is that the forensic experts dont have to everytime sit and surf the web. They receive tips and then they start digging the truth in the news. This not only saves their time but also helps them in managing the huge list computer crimes within their limited number of forensic experts. Their senior experts point out that child pornography consumes a substantial amount of their investigative time. This is so because child pornography is more pervasive than one might anticipate.

In most of the cases the evidence could include computers, cell phones, digital cameras or other electronic devices. The Bureau of Justice Assistance funds the computer forensics program with a $750,000 grant. It is worth to note that people around the world are realizing that computer forensics is an important part of forensic science that can help in solving complex criminal cases, with some ease.

The ImageMASSter Solo-3 IT from ICS is a hand held, high speed data duplication tool. It integrates all the latest advanced features in data imaging. It is capable of copying data from IDE and laptop drives, Serial ATA and SCSI drives as well as Flash Cards. With the integrated Link MASSter Option, data can be copied from unopened computers using the FireWire or USB2 interface. The source’s hard drive is write protected and one can copy data to 2 targets hard drives simultaneously..

The copied data can be verified to achieve maximum reliability. On the fly MD5 or CRC32 hashing capabilities are available using the sector-by-sector copy mode to guarantee exact replica of the source’s data without modification, re-arrangement or corruption. Priced at $1,999 for the US region, the product can be obtained by placing an order with their distributors around the globe.

The official partners of ICS in India are Agape Inc and any inquiries for ImageMASSter Solo-3 IT in India can be made by contacting us.

Recently ICS has announced that their products are comatible with Mac. It released a new software option to be used with the Solo-3 Forensic and LinkMASSter units that will allow the user to acquire data in a forensic manner from  unopened MAC computer or MAC laptop through USB or FireWire ports.

A computer virus is a computer program that can copy itself and infect a computer without the permission or knowledge of the user. The term “virus” is also used to refer to many different types of malware and adware programs.

Once your machine gets infected by a virus, it takes control and slowly tears you apart in the following ways:

1. It attempts to harm your system; either by slowing down the performance or completely corrupting it.
2. It tries to spread to multiple computers, if you are connected in a network.
3. Phishing: Some viruses control your system and try to steal important information from your system.
4. Sometimes, a virus can also defame you by stealing your sensitive information and displaying it to public. Such a virus is usually designed by hackers.

There are various ways in which you can secure your system from the onslaught of viruses which will be discussed later; till then the super tip is to use a strong antivirus program and keep it updated.

Informative articles always help everyone as they result in knowledge addition. Keeping the same thought in mind, the links this week point to some very informative articles, which will surely help you.

1. Computers are now weapons used to steal people’s identity, defraud companies of trade secrets, or prey on children online. Such cyber threats must be tackled in a proper way. Read more
2. Your hard drive got corrupted and you fear the possibility of losing your important data. Heres when data recovery can help you. Michael Stankard explains how hard drives work, why they fail and what you as users can do to protect your data. Read more
3. A new research center will study ways to improve personal identification management on the Internet to combat identity theft and fraud, narcotics and cyber terrorism. Read more

This week has been very busy so far as we have been working hard for the release of our new mobile forensics product. This product will help the forensic investigators as it would be available in different versions.

Anyways, this week we are presenting the links which will provide helpful information about the importance of information security and the new updates to the rules. We hope they would be helpful for everyone.

1. Are You Familiar With the New E-Discovery Rules? Read more
2. 6 burning questions about network security. Read more
3. With so many ways for people to conduct their lives on the internet, their personal information ends up online. Safeguarding yourself against cyber threats becomes necessary. Read more

With every company trying to outsmart their competitors, this competition is not staying healthy. Some companies are using wrong means to either defame or cause huge losses to their competitor(s). The wrong means indlude bribing competitor’s employee to reveal secrets or manipulating/deleting important information of the competitor by gaining unethical access to their systems. All such activities fall under the umbrella of electronic data tampering. This concept when extended to someone who has been served with a lawsuit, is known as electronic evidence tampering, which has been rising exponentially.

A recent report by KPMG said that technology-related fraud has also emerged as ‘the fastest-growing and most pervasive category of fraud’ in the business world. In 2004, just 19 per cent of the firms polled reported such offences; by last year, the figure was 59 per cent. There is no way to determine exactly how widespread tampering of electronic evidence is, but law firms, enforcement agencies, private sector computer forensics firms such as KPMG and are all seeing the uptrend.

Where previously the person would just delete e-mail correspondence or documents, many now format their hard disks or use specialised electronic erasing programs to cover their electronic trails. They tamper with or destroy electronic evidence by downloaded hacking tools or installing an unsecured wireless network before sending out defamatory e-mail messages or even changing their hard disk or computer.

Although tampering with the evidences can attract punishment that could also bring jail. Despite the hefty penalties, experts believe cases of tampering with or destroying evidence will continue to rise, as the perpetrators are getting better at it.

Every time we hear the word ‘CRIME’, we only think of robberies, murders and detectives examining the crime scene, interrogating witnesses and finally nailing the guilty. But we never think outside these instances because we feel that crime is bound only to these boundaries. But this is not true at all. Today, cyber crime accounts as the most troublesome crime, troubling individuals and corporations alike. All the detailed information on the importance of cyber forensics is provided in the article below.

Paraben Corporation - a leader in computer forensic software, is conducting the first annual PFIC conference in Park City, Utah on November 9-12, 2008. Paraben’s Forensic Innovations Conference(PFIC 2008) will be providing training, lectures and workshops for FREE! That’s right, Paraben has generously waived their registration fees ($995) to allow people understand the new techniques and tools in forensics.

Also there would be a CSI stick bootcamp, which will teach the operations of the new CSI stick - which is a Compact Mobile Phone Forensic Solution. The fee for attending this workshop is $399. And yes, the new CSI stick will also be provided to the participants of this workshop. There would be more sessions on different topics of forensics but the one featured session you won’t want to miss is P2 Commander 101.

Attend this conference to know the new techniques and tools to improve your forensic investigation results.

The links for this week cover a wide range of topics from data recovery to ethical hacking and network security tools. The articles include some How to do it yourself tutorials, as well.

1. The Windows way of successful data recovery. Read more

2. IBM’s research paper on Ethical Hacking. Read more

3. Importance of newtwork security forensic appliances in evidence gathering. Read more

A police officer rushes on to a crime scene, plays with the computer and executes some 150 evidence gathering commands in 15 minutes. A scene from CSI? No, this is a common scene for investigating police officers; thanks to Microsoft.

Microsoft had released a free tool (Beta version) called - Computer Online Forensic Evidence Extractor (COFEE), that can be loaded onto a portable device such as a USB drive. COFEE automates some 150 evidence-gathering commands for computers in short time. This tool was available only to law enforcement agencies to test the functionality and strength of the tool. Being a Microsoft product, COFEE is designed to extract information from Windows-based systems only.

The best part with the tool is that an officer with “no or basic training” can extract the data in about 15 minutes and maintain its integrity. It also eliminates the need to seize a computer itself, which typically involves disconnecting from a network, turning off the power and potentially losing data. Instead, the investigator can scan for evidence on site.

Many law enforcement agencies in around 15 countries, including Poland, Philippines, Germany, New Zealand and the United States have been using COFEE to crack a variety of online crimes and recover digital evidence. And seeing the success of the beta version, Microsoft has decided to roll out its release version soon, with more features.