NCJ Number
226191
Journal
Law Enforcement Technology Volume: 36 Issue: 1 Dated: January 2009 Pages: 30,32,37
Date Published
January 2009
Length
7 pages
Annotation
In order to illustrate standards and procedures for managing digital evidence, this article presents the lifecycle of one item of digital evidence: a video interview with "Victor," a hypothetical person of interest, recorded in a digital format.
Abstract
The evidence lifecycle discussed involves the recording of the interview, its transmission to a central location where it is to be stored, making it available to authorized users, and then responding to a request to put it on DVD. In the latter case, two copies will be produced, one copy for the prosecutor and another copy for the defense attorney. At each phase of the lifecycle of this evidence, best practices will be identified based on specific guidelines and principles recommended by the Scientific Working Group on Digital Evidence (SWGDE), which was established in February 1998 under a collaborative effort of the Federal Crime Laboratory Director. This constituted the U.S.-based component of standardization efforts conducted by the International Organization on Computer Evidence (IOCE). The SWGDE was charged with developing Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) for collecting, preserving, examining, and transferring digital evidence in a manner that safeguards its accuracy and reliability. The SOPs illustrated are designed to respond to the following questions regarding the admissibility of digital evidence: What is the evidence? How was it obtained? When was it collected? Who handled it? Why did that person handle it? Where has it been stored and why? Was it copied and duplicated in any manner after storage, and when, how, and by whom?