Archive for the ‘Legal & Policy Issues’ Category

Now available: 3 free model policies for social networking support

Wednesday, May 12th, 2010

Our 2-day on-site training devotes a fair amount of time to policy issues: investigative ethics applied online, undercover work, deconfliction, and employee stress management. However, while we talked about the need for policy, we didn’t have a model to offer.

Well, now we do! In the “White Papers” section of our Web site, you’ll now find three separate model policies: social networking investigations, official agency communication, and employee off-duty use.

Why 3 policies?

Law enforcement presence online isn’t just about gathering evidence. It’s also about ensuring that employees represent themselves and their agencies as professionals at all times (including not conducting investigations via their personal accounts). Also, just as agencies simultaneously conduct investigations and community relations in their communities, they should at least consider doing the same online.

The three policies complement each other, and as Todd is quoted in our press release, they’re meant to minimize the risk and maximize the reward of an online presence. They also fill a gap: while many policies are available from private companies, few are published by law enforcement agencies.

What the policies cover

The “Investigative Use of Social Networking” policy provides for:

  • Professional online conduct
  • Investigation preparation
  • Undercover work
  • Legal issues
  • Employee stress management

The “Agency Official Use of Social Networking” policy discusses:

  • Social media tools
  • Strategy for use
  • Communicating on the agency’s behalf
  • Restrictions on use
  • Handling requests from media and general public

The “Employee Off-Duty Use of Social Networking” policy includes:

  • Employee self-identification as a police officer
  • Confidential and sensitive information
  • Legal requirements
  • Disciplinary action

Because these are model policies, be sure to run them through administrators and department or other legal staff before you implement them, as state or jurisdictional laws may need to be specifically addressed.

Who will benefit?

We timed these policies’ release during the week of the ICAC Conference in Jacksonville, FL, where Todd is exhibiting. Now, we know ICAC investigators are well-versed in online investigation and thus policy – but we also know that their investigations can take them into jurisdictions where other detectives are not familiar with online work, undercover or otherwise.

So whether you’re an investigator whose agency needs social networking policies, or you know of investigators who do, please feel free to pass these along. You can refer others to the policy page using this address:

http://tinyurl.com/verepolicies

And if you have any questions, please let us know at info (at) veresoftware (dot) com !

Tags: , , , , , ,
Posted in Company News, Legal & Policy Issues | No Comments »

DragNet? In what form?

Wednesday, May 5th, 2010

In February, CNet reported that police are looking for a “back door” to private data, in the form of “a national Web interface linking police computers with those of Internet and e-mail providers so requests can be sent and received electronically.”

This was followed up in April by a revelation that the Department of Justice had requested Yahoo emails without a warrant—because the emails were older than 180 days and stored on Yahoo servers rather than on a local machine.

Civil libertarians, of course, regard these stories as evidence of Big Brother manifesting all his totalitarian glory. But the original concept of a national network, says its originator, has been misrepresented.

More efficient, not more invasive

Sgt. Frank Kardasz is director of the Phoenix (Arizona) area Internet Crimes Against Children task force and, in a report to the Commerce Department’s Online Safety and Technology Working Group, wrote about the need for Internet service providers (ISPs) at least to maintain records for longer than the few weeks they currently do—up to a year or longer.

“The trouble with real life policing is that there are reporting delays from victims, overwhelming caseloads for detectives, forensics analysts and prosecutors, time delays or no response from Internet service providers and many other systemic issues that impede the rapid completion of our work,” he wrote in his report, “Internet Crimes Against Children and Internet Service Providers: Investigators Request Improved Data Retention and Response.”

Similar problems exist among government agencies, which is why Los Angeles County instituted the Electronic Suspected Child Abuse Report System. The Web-based system links public agencies together, replacing outdated forms of communication like faxes and postal mail, and reducing the likelihood that charges will be dropped or reduced due to missing evidence.

Not a direct link from law enforcement to private records, it doesn’t carry quite the same implications for privacy. It does, however, solve very similar problems, and as the first of its kind in the country, could easily serve as a model for other efforts.

Logistical concerns

The need for a strong model is particularly important when it comes to security. Many companies have hesitated over moving to “the cloud,” fearful of what might happen if a malware-infected PC accessed cloud-based private information. (Many of these issues are discussed in our white paper, “Basic Digital Officer Safety.”)

However, the U.S. Army is now using “milBook”, a secure Facebook-like interface restricted to its own personnel. Connecting people with each other as well as with defense-related topics, milBook facilitates the sharing of a broad range of information. Fundamentally, it might be compared to the Regional Information Sharing System, though more socially oriented.

Whether this would be as easy to set up is debatable, however. The Army, after all, has the DoD to administer its private network. For the DOJ to set up and maintain a public-private information exchange would not, to put it lightly, sit well with groups like the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

More likely may be for the DOJ to require ISPs to set up their own networks. Some already do, as CNet pointed out. The networks would have to comply with certain requirements regarding data storage and speed of retrieval, but the companies would retain control of user information.

The need for better ISP support

Kardasz noted, based on a 2009 survey of 100 investigators:

  • 61% reported ISP delays and limited time periods for storage detrimentally affected their investigations.
  • 47% reported they had to end investigations because the ISP didn’t retain the data they needed to make a case.
  • 89% wanted to see a national network established to make legal process requests more efficient.

“Investigators recognize that the subject of data preservation is controversial,” Kardasz wrote. “I think investigators respect the Constitution, support the rights of Commerce and simultaneously want to protect citizens from cybercrime. They seem to be asking for a system that is more efficient, not more invasive, a system that favors the crime-fighters instead of the criminals.”

What law enforcement can do

In last month’s issue of Law Enforcement Technology, Vere president and CEO Todd Shipley was quoted as saying, “It’s not just a federal problem. It’s a state and local problem too because the victims are citizens of the local community.”

So while ISPs can improve their processes, so can law enforcement. Todd’s recommendations: Know how to take reports on cyber crimes. Collect information the cybercrime experts need. Know how to share information and with whom. These pieces, the building blocks of professional police response, must be in place so that whatever ISPs institute to help law enforcement, it will be supported rather than criticized.

Christa M. Miller is Vere Software’s marketing/public relations consultant. She specializes in law enforcement and digital forensics and can be reached at christa at christammiller dot com.

Tags: , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Legal & Policy Issues | No Comments »

Cloud computing: Not just for geeks or feds

Monday, February 8th, 2010

Think online investigation is just for the high-tech crimes types, the computer forensics geeks or the feds? Not so, says Todd in his interview with Cyber Speak’s Podcast (hosted, ironically, by two former federal agents). The more people are online, the more they’re likely to use cloud services, the more important it is for local law enforcement to be there too.

Todd’s appearance on Cyber Speak came about because of his two-part article on cloud computing, which had appeared in December in DFI News. He and Ovie Carroll discuss:

Impact of cloud computing on first responders

Detectives performing searches can’t simply pull the plug on a running computer anymore (a fact which prosecutors are having to get used to). They need to be able to perform data triage and possibly even volatile data collection.

Why? Because knowing whether a suspect has an online presence is critical to whether an arrest is made—and what happens afterward. Whether users are actively storing files “in the cloud” or simply members of social networking sites, law enforcement officers who don’t find evidence and therefore, do not make an arrest risk that suspect going online and deleting all incriminating information.

Why is this a problem? Because the very nature of cloud storage means investigators may not be able to access a logical hard drive somewhere to recover the evidence. First, the sheer amounts of data stored on servers make this close to impossible. Second, there are jurisdictional issues.

Are you exceeding your authority?

Not only may information be stored outside your jurisdiction, but it may also be stored in another country altogether—one with different criminal and privacy laws. Accessing evidence of a crime in the United States may actually mean committing a crime in another country (Todd relates the story of two FBI agents for whom arrest warrants were issued in Russia).

This is a problem for local law enforcement, which Todd notes has been left largely to its own devices when it comes to online crime. Only Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) task forces have clear direction from the federal government on how to proceed.

Hence it’s easy for local police to kick Internet crimes up to regional, state or federal task forces. But as Todd points out, more people coming online means more crimes being committed against people in local jurisdictions both large and small. Law enforcement at every level needs to be able to respond.

Please listen to Todd and Ovie, and then come back and tell us what you think!

Christa M. Miller is Vere Software’s marketing/public relations consultant. She specializes in law enforcement and public safety and can be reached at christa at christammiller dot com.

Tags: , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Company News, Legal & Policy Issues | No Comments »

Legal Issues with Online Investigations: Some background

Friday, January 15th, 2010

As Executive Director and Senior Counsel of the National Law Center for Children and Families, Richard Whidden is most familiar with laws and precedents related to child pornography—but stresses that investigators of other crimes can take away important information, too. “Much of the case law on electronic evidence comes from child porn cases because those are what prosecutors take on,” Whidden says.

During his webinar, “Legal Issues with Online Investigation,” on Thursday, January 21, Whidden will be discussing a sampling of cases from 2009 that had to do with Internet and computer forensics. One of the primary cases, however, has to do not with child pornography but instead with steroids.

Specifically, U.S. v. Comprehensive Drug Testing, Inc. describes forensic procedures relative to search and seizure of electronically stored evidence. Although it applies to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals’ jurisdiction, it’s likely that other courts will look to the decision when dealing with their own issues of electronic evidence.

The case also illustrates how the process of e-discovery has evolved over the past 10 years. Typically this is difficult to discuss. As Whidden says, “You could have entire symposiums on how the law has changed over the last 10 years, before you even break out the crystal ball on how it will change over the next 10.”

Notably, law changes according to the technology. “We’ve gone from pornographic images of children, to streaming video of abuse taking place,” says Whidden. “Modes of transmission change. Cell phone technology is much more prevalent now, and will continue to evolve.”

Whidden will cover other legal issues, such as the definition of “possession” of child pornography, procedures related to computer related evidence, search and seizure issues, and the difference between state and federal prosecutions. He will not discuss civil cases, only criminal cases because of the higher burden of proof.

Christa M. Miller is Vere Software’s marketing/public relations consultant. She specializes in law enforcement and public safety and can be reached at christa at christammiller dot com.

Tags: , , , , , , ,
Posted in Legal & Policy Issues | 1 Comment »

Cyber Vigilantism or Cyber Neighborhood Watch?

Saturday, March 28th, 2009

Governments across the globe have been trying to deal with Cybercrime and its impact on our communities. Some have done a better job than others in responding to those crimes. The rise in Internet users over the past decade and our dependence on it as a medium for communication has increased the number of concerned citizen users. The Internet is no longer just a tool to do our shopping from our home, or a tool to research a school paper. Through social networking the Internet is truly becoming a community. With those communities come problems, but also concerned citizens, ready to rise up and act in the best interests of their community.

Law enforcement is still grappling with its response to enforcing the law on the Internet. They continue to meet the challenges with mixed results. Because of this enforcement vacuum there recently has been a rise in what can only be described as citizen activists. The rise in social networking has brought together many diverse people. The commonality among them is their willingness to protect their piece of the Internet. As evidence of this are several examples of concerned netizens standing up and taking actions to protect their Internet.

Twitter, the recent social networking phenomenon, gave rise to an incident recently”, as commented on by socialmedia.biz, where a “Twitterer” in Virginia found a threat posted on a Wikipedia page against a school in St. Louis. Enlisting others from the Twitter ranks they tracked down information about the student posting the threat and made plans via Twitter about what to do with the information. The local police department was contacted and the threat relayed. However, the police complaint taker was less than cooperative according to reports and stated he “did not have access to the Web”. Another neighboring agency was contacted and appropriate actions were taken to resolve the issue.

And as far away as China, the Internet is changing the way the people feel about, and communicate. Locating people online has become almost a sport. When unpleasant comments were posted online after the earthquake deaths in the Sichuan province, numerous Netizens researched and attacked the posters online. Even Chinese government officials are not immune from response. With millions of people online, the Chinese government is finding it increasingly difficult to control its citizen’s response to overzealous government officials. Wearing a $25,000 watch in the picture you post on the Internet is not a probably a good idea when your government salary is not enough to cover its cost. The official was later dismissed partly I am sure to the Netizens complaints. In China this growing trend of Cyber-vigilantism is called “renrou sousuo”, or “human-flesh searches”. It is done spontaneously by Netizens to ferret out perceived wrong doers.

To the extreme in this country we have the Texas Border Watch program. This is a novel concept of recruiting Cyber border watchers. Individuals can watch streaming video over the Internet from cameras mounted at various locations on the southern U.S. Border and report suspicious activity. According to a report by NPR, “43,000 pairs of eyes are watching the Texas-Mexico border”. Netizens observations of the border have lead to arrests of wrongdoers.

Cyber Vigilantism is not necessarily new. A few years ago a Korean girl was publically humiliated online after not picking up after her dog on a train. In the late 1990’s Cyber-vigilantism was thought to be a reasonable response to the emerging online crime problem because of law enforcements inability to respond to the problem. Even extremists groups have been tracked by vigilantes on the web. It’s a popular enough concept that Wikipedia has a page defining it.

The dark side of this argument has been groups such as Perverted Justice whose regular work was chasing those who would prey on our children on the Internet. Their member’s antics have been regularly discredited as well as praised for their aggressive and persistent actions which arguably may not be within the law. In the UK recently a law was passed to try and curtail the extreme amount of pornography found on the Internet. The “Extreme Porn” law has given rise to a group, the Enforcers of the Extreme Porn Law, who are dissatisfied with UK law enforcements position about not actively policing extreme porn.

How much have law enforcements response to Internet crime changed in the past decade? Certainly law enforcement has gotten better at dealing with the technology and on many levels their response is better. Many law enforcement agencies are even using social networking sites to communicate with its citizens. But there is no real drive to recruit netizens to become the eyes and ears of law enforcement online. In a recent blog entry by Bill Schrier in his blog “Note from a City CIO” he wrote an article “Twitter, Facebook not ready for Government 2.0”. Ready or not Government will have to address social networking and the netizens on it, more likely sooner than anticipated at its growth rate.

With the isolated examples of netizens reaction to criminal’s online; law enforcement may be missing an opportunity to recruit a neighborhood “Net-Watch” type of faithful following. Law enforcement could guide netizens and encourage their support. With the Internets ability to mobilize vast numbers in response to a crime on the Internet an opportunity exists to establish a major blow to criminals everywhere. People now spend their waking hours, and some with web cameras, their sleeping ones too, online. It may be time for law enforcement to expand its online ranks with properly trained and recruited cyber watchers. It might also be a way of corralling the behavior of some of the Cyber vigilantes that have gone a little far in their attempts to hang online wrongdoers. Look out online criminals, your next door neighbor may soon be watching you.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Investigative Techniques, Legal & Policy Issues | 1 Comment »

Threat of Cyber Crime Continues to Increase

Friday, February 13th, 2009

Jim Kouri, formerly the Chief of Police of the New York City housing project in Washington Heights, wrote recently in MensNewsDaily.com about Cyber Crime and its increasing popularity as a criminal endeavor. He rightfully identified that there is a difference between critical infrastructure protection (Cyber security threats) and Cyber crimes (traditional crimes committed through the use of technology). This is far too often overlooked at the national level and appropriate consideration given to both areas. Threats to our critical infrastructure are not the same as Cyber criminals stealing from our citizens. However, from the initial look at a crime, say a “Phishing” scam against a bank, a law enforcement investigator does not know if this criminal act is a foreign state attacking our economic system by trying to make the bank fail, or a teenager from one of the old eastern block countries simply scamming unsuspecting customers out of their funds.

Law enforcement from the outset often ignores these crimes due to the investigative complexity of the crime and the lack of training and tools to effective pursue the evidence. The current economic situation is making things even worse for those agency’s who do attempt to address Internet based crime. In California High Tech Crime Task Forces are being shut down due to the budget crisis. The Northern California Computer Crime Task Force has shut down and the San Diego area CATCH Team will shut down on February 16th. Both of these task forces have made a significant impact on criminals using the Internet to commit crimes. Yet, we are allowing them to close and very little is being done to stop it.

The new administration is due to announce the appointment of its new Cyber Czar. I don’t have a hope for the near future with the President saying one thing before his inauguration:

“As president, I’ll make cyber security the top priority that it should be in the 21st century,” … “I’ll declare our cyber-infrastructure a strategic asset and appoint a National Cyber Adviser who will report directly to me.” (from a speech at Purdue University last July)

And doing another, which is by most accounts putting the new Cyber Czar post several layers down in the Department of Homeland Security. If it does end up in DHS it will be another function unable to deal with the national problem, because the appointee will have to facilitate conversations with the FBI and other organizations outside of DHS responsible for Cyber crime investigation. In addition the new Cyber Czar would have to fight for funding within his or her own organization.

As with the intelligence collection and review issues, as determined by the 911 commission, Cyber crime is another area not coordinated nationally with the many different stake holders in the arena. The better model would be to have the Cyber Czar in the White House with positive control over budgets and agency actions responding to the problem. The National Intelligence Director’s position is the best model for this issue. The problem is not for a single agency to try and solve but it should be the responsibility of a single entity to coordinate the response nationally. Cyber crime is dealt with at all levels of law enforcement in this country, from the City police investigator looking into Vice crime on Craig’s list to International Child Porn rings investigated by the FBI. Yet with all this crime occurring there is no coordination of cyber criminal intelligence or investigations from the bottom to the top.

Lastly, the person selected as Cyber Czar should have a concept of operational response to both the Infrastructure Protection space as well as the Cyber crime arena. They are two different animals and require different skill sets, but complementary responses. We will have to wait and see if the President’s pick is up to the challenge and given the proper authority and resources required to accomplish the mission.

Technorati Tags: ,,,,,,

Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Legal & Policy Issues, Online Investigations in the News | No Comments »

Administration to establish major office for cyber matters

Friday, February 6th, 2009

Shortly after taking office President Obama announced that there would be a “Cyber Czar” (my term not his) named “…who would report directly to the president, greatly increase funding for interoperable first responder communications and spend $5 billion in global counterterrorism cooperation…”

They are addressing Cyber threats and Cyber infrastructure so where in the new administration’s proposals is the part where we as a country deal with the problem of Cyber Crime? Well for the first time an emphasis, albeit small is noted in the Homeland Security Agenda that says:

“Develop a Cyber Crime Strategy to Minimize the Opportunities for Criminal Profit: Shut down the mechanisms used to transmit criminal profits by shutting down untraceable Internet payment schemes. Initiate a grant and training program to provide federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies the tools they need to detect and prosecute cyber crime”

This is significant in that it is a change in direction from the previous administration’s plan that did not address the Cyber Crime problem. The Bush plan was focused on Infrastructure protection and did not effectively address the overall issue of Cyber Crime. Although many of the items described in Obama’s plan are similar to recommendations previously made to and by the Bush administration.

I have been arguing for some time that there needs to be a comprehensive national plan to deal with Cyber Crime. There is currently no clear understanding of how much Cyber Crime is being committed in the U.S. To complicate that there is no requirement for U.S Law Enforcement agencies to collect and report (in the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting-UCR system) on any Cyber Crime that is committed against our citizenry. So exactly how do we know the magnitude of the crime committed and where to apply the resources?

A comprehensive national plan needs to include several things:

  • A clear definition of Cyber Crime.
  • A reporting mechanism for law enforcement to identify the amount and nature of the Cyber Crimes committed.
  • National Stake holder input. This is not just a federal problem it involves law enforcement at all levels including the judiciary and each levels issues need to be addressed.
  • Sufficient funding must be provided to clearly address the problem at multiple levels.
  • Tools to deal with Cyber crime investigations MUST be common and available.
  • Encourage the reporting of Cyber Crime to local law enforcement agencies.
  • Develop better communication on Cyber Crime and its investigation between Federal, State and local LE
  • Development of an interoperable international legal framework to assist in the investigation of cyber related crimes.
  • And lastly, we need to make cyber investigations an everyday policing event for law enforcement.

We will have to wait and see what the Obama administration will do with this proposal in the DHS agenda. The need has not gone away with the “Change”, it will only continue to grow.

Tags: , , , , , ,
Posted in Legal & Policy Issues | No Comments »