Computer forensics investigation Archives

Free Will or Foul Play?

Twenty-year-old Sean Purcell lived in the basement of his parents’ home. His living area had its own entrance. With school and work, it wasn’t unusual for his parents not to see him every day. He also wasn’t known for returning texts or phone calls speedily, so the Purcell’s weren’t too concerned when they didn’t see him for a couple of days. They didn’t get worried until Mrs. Purcell realized their son wasn’t raiding the pantry or the refrigerator. She immediately checked the basement. The first thing she noticed was Sean’s cell phone lying on the bed. The home screen showed some missed calls and texts from his on again - off again girlfriend Kayla. Mrs. Purcell didn’t know the password to get into the phone [...]

It Just Seemed Too Good: How An Employee Gained Unauthorized Access to HIPPA Records and Lost Her Job

Do the best you can, be kind and courtesy, have good work product and treat clients, patients and co-workers with respect, work well with others and be on top of your game. All these applied to our Client, Amanda’s Office Manager Sharon, she was a team player from the outside and yet, things just seemed too good. That saying: If it’s not broken, don’t fix it! So Amanda disregarded signs of change. She didn’t notice Sharon was beginning to be a few minutes late getting to work, the phone rang a couple more times than necessary, the once chipper and eager girl she hired was more lax and a bit distant, but her work was good, so “don’t fix it” applied until one day she [...]

He didn’t send the emails, but they came from his computer

Computer forensic analysis can range in scope depending on the case. We get cases ranging from clients wanting to find deleted emails, pictures, etc. all the way to malicious software investigations. As with all digital forensics, forensic data recovery is the most common request that we get followed closely by mobile phone spyware detection with social media engineering being the third most common. The key to a successful computer forensics investigation is that a competent computer forensics expert be willing to explore all conceivable possibilities while performing the investigation. I am reminded of a case we had about a year ago where the client had an employee log into his email account from their office computer and download emails that were sent to some of [...]

Forensic Computer Analysis Can Uncover What’s Lurking Inside

Carrying cards instead of cash, well, it used to make us feel a bit safer. But no longer. Credit card theft has been a long-time problem, but now the thieves are using a new avenue and it puts businesses as well as consumers at risk. Several employees at the county courthouse in the northern Texas town of McKinney discovered that their credit card information had been compromised after they had had lunch at a local restaurant. The thief wasn’t an unscrupulous employee or patron who made purchases using their credit card information, it was a hacker. That’s right, a hacker got into the restaurant’s computer system and lifted the customer’s information. This is just part of an alarming trend in hackers infiltrating small business systems. [...]