HUNTINGTON, W.Va. — The “internet of things” is one of the focus areas for the first boot camp for law enforcement officers to come out of a collaboration between Marshall University and the National White Collar Crime Center, also known as NW3C.
“Literally almost anything that you use on a daily basis can be connected to the internet,” said John Sammons, assistant professor and director of Marshall University’s digital forensics and information assurance program. “Just walk through a Best Buy.”
The cyber-investigation boot camp for law enforcement officers runs from July 31 to Aug. 4 at Marshall’s Arthur Weisberg Family Applied Engineering Complex in Huntington.
Overall, Sammons said the goal was to train investigators in how to properly preserve, seize and collect digital evidence from both technical and legal perspectives.
Beyond devices connected to the internet, topics for the boot camp included the search and seizure law for digital evidence, cellular technology investigations, multimedia forensics, social media and vehicle forensics.
In addition to records of phone calls and text messages sent through vehicle systems, “The vehicle itself is starting to record some very, very interesting artifacts, in some instances with great detail,” Sammons explained.
Certain vehicles have capabilities of recording dates, times, latitudes and longitudes when doors or trunks are opened and closed.
“So if you can get down to that level, imagine somebody trying to dispose of a body. You’ve got those artifacts available to you,” Sammons said.
In the last few months, he noted data from a Fitbit has been introduced as evidence in a legal proceeding and an Ohio law enforcement agency got a search warrant for an arson suspect and then consulted a cardiologist to confirm there was “not much” exertion when the suspect claimed to be clearing a home during a fire.
“There isn’t a crime committed today that couldn’t have some sort of digital evidence associated with it,” Sammons said. “That’s what this kind of training is designed to do, is to keep folks as current as possible.”
Sammons, who started his career in law enforcement with the Huntington Police Department in 1989, is the author of several books about digital forensics.
His latest book, written with Lars Daniel, “Digital Forensics Trial Graphics: Teaching the Jury through Effective Use of Visuals,” was published in March.
Trial preparation is on the boot camp agenda.
“If you’ve ever tried to do tech support for, let’s say, your aunt or your grandmother or your parents, and tried to explain to them how to check their e-mail or set the e-mail account up, you kind of got an idea of what kind of challenge you’re looking at,” Sammons said.
“It can be very hard for someone that really has no interest or experience in technology to try to grasp how all of this stuff actually works.”
As of Thursday morning, space was still available for the Marshall and NWC3 cyber-investigation boot camp which had been approved for 32 hours of in-service training credit.
Registration was available by phone at 304-696-7241 or e-mail at john.sammons@marshall.edu.