Put Your CSI On

The FBI operates 14 Regional Computer Forensics Laboratory, or RCFLs. They have just published their RCFL Program's Fiscal Year 2007 Annual Report.

Here are some highlights from the report:

• During 2007, RCFL experts conducted 4,634 exams, processing 1,288 terabytes of information. (How much data is that? Consider this: all the books in the Library of Congress equal only about 20 terabytes!)
  
• RCFLs provided assistance to 685 agencies (608 were state and/or local).
  
• A total of 76,581 digital devices were examined (the most popular media by far—CDs, coming in at 37,424; followed by hard disk drives at 17,378; floppy disks at 11,781; and DVDs at 4,374).
  
• An interesting trend: the number of CDs, cell phones, and flash media devices examined doubled from the previous year.
  
• A total of 9,762 law enforcement personnel were trained, and, for the first time, RCFL instructors traveled overseas to share their expertise with approximately 169 government representatives (several RCFLs also hosted foreign visitors).
  

And Microsoft has developed the Computer Online Forensic Evidence Extractor (COFEE) to assist law enforcement in their work. This is a thumb drive with 150 commands built in. When connected to a computer, it is set to work quickly in decrypting passwords, allowing content to be reviewed and analyzing internet use.

The thumb drives were distributed to law enforcement agencies in 15 countries beginning last June. They aren't available to private citizens. The intent is to allow law enforcement to more quickly handle computer forensics tasks, whether they have a budget to support a forensics lab or not.