Saturday, 9 June 2018

How To Conduct Computer Forensic Investigation

By Roger McDonald


Cybercrimes are increasing with each day that is passing. The modern criminals do not break into banks anymore like they used to do. Instead, they join modern universities and learn computer skills, which they later use in hacking into banks and stealing millions of money. These criminal activities no longer require the corporation of several individuals. All it takes is a single person who is well skilled and good computing equipment. This is what computer forensic investigation entails.

Given the change in crimes, the field of digital forensic investigation has become more important to law enforcement. In order to protect private citizens, it is become a crucial task to track malicious online activities as perpetrated by criminal. Being able to track digital activities allows law enforcement personnel to link cyber communication and information that is stored digitally to physical evidence in criminal activities.

With the help of computer forensics, investigators can expose planned criminal activities and thus help to prevent future cyber-crimes. There are five important steps that are involved to ensure success in this job. With the help of these steps investigators can perform an exhaustive and useful investigations. The steps involved are policy development, evidence evaluation, evidence acquirement, evidence analysis and the final step is documenting and reporting.

To achieve a successful cyber investigation, the first rule is to have strict guidelines and procedures which an organization operates within. The set procedures help regulate the operations of the organization and help prevent exposing IT systems to cyber threats by preventing workers from taking part in risky activities. These procedures also protect against breaching the organizational standards and practices ensuring investigators do their job without any interference.

For instance, the procedures may include instances when investigators are authorized to recover digital evidence. They also stipulate the procedure for evidence recovery, storage, and documentation among others. Personnel authorized to engage in these activities must also be stipulated along with the kinds of actions they can take. This way, it is possible to trace actions back to the people who did them and to avoid jeopardizing evidence collected.

There exist much tasks and responsibilities that computer forensic investigators do. Their career is about collecting digital data from computers to be presented in legal cases and to law enforcement. Safeguarding computers from cyber threats, analyzing data, providing reports and feedback, and recovering files is also part of the job. The investigators may also be physically in a court of law as expert witnesses.

Qualifying to work in this field requires one to have a bachelor degree in computer forensics. Besides that, one can have a degree in a related course. One may also join a community college and study a suitable course for two years before they can transfer to a four-year university or college to become holders of a bachelor degree. There are multiple starting points in this field and one can start with low academic qualifications and rise over time.

One can increase their chances of landing a job by attaining certification in this field. The requirements one is required to have usually depend on the job position they are applying for. Some positions require higher academic qualifications beyond a bachelor degree and work experience.




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