Chapter 1: Types of Computer-Based Investigations

Welcome to the 21st century, where almost everything in life is connected to an electronic device. There are digital cameras inside doorbells; your smartphone tracks your daily progress from work to home and back again; you get social media updates when you go to the gym, a show, or travel to a new city.

Your phone calls, bank access, and medical appointments are all tracked via digital technology. If it tracks your mundane daily activity, what about criminal or unethical behavior? That activity is also followed, and if you are a digital forensic investigator, you must know the repositories of the digital evidence and how to analyze it. There is almost no criminal activity that will not have digital evidence associated with it and, as an investigator, it is your job to find all available evidence, process it, and present findings to the finder of fact.

This chapter will introduce you to the different topics of computer-based investigations, from criminal acts investigated by the police to civil and potentially illegal actions performed by an employee or external third party that are examined by a nongovernmental investigator.

While the goal is the same, to present evidence about an incident, the methods for each are slightly different. It is essential for you to understand the similarities between the investigations; being able to present evidence in a judicial proceeding and recognize the differences. 

The topics that will be covered in this chapter are as follows:

• Differences in computer-based investigations
• Criminal investigations
• Corporate investigations