ORANGE – With criminals becoming more technologically savvy, the FBI and local law enforcement agencies have joined forces to tackle cyber crime using the new $7 million Orange County Regional Computer Forensics Laboratory in Orange.
The laboratory, the 15th of its kind in the nation, is dedicated to the examination of digital evidence in cases ranging from homicides to terrorism to child pornography and fraud.
FBI Director Robert S. Mueller, flanked by law enforcement officials, was on hand Wednesday, January 5, 2011, for the opening of the FBI’s newest Regional Computer Forensic Laboratory, in the city of Orange. The OCRCFL is devoted to the examination of digital evidence in criminal and national security investigations, such as, terrorism, child pornography, homicide, violent crimes, the theft or destruction of intellectual property, internet crime, and fraud.
Almost every investigation today examines evidence found in “a hard drive, a thumb drive, a cell phone or some other mechanism for either communicating or storing data,” said FBI Director Robert S. Mueller Wednesday during a ribbon-cutting ceremony.
The first forensics laboratory that allowed agents to review, investigate and use data in a courtroom was opened in San Diego in 2000.
“Then digital forensics were a small part of our criminal investigations but since that time with the impact of the Internet, smartphones, wireless technology and the like, the growth of this media has overwhelmed many of us in the course of doing our investigations,” Mueller said.
The new laboratory – one of the largest in the nation – will have 25 forensic examiners who will extract information from digital devices using the latest technology.
In 2009, there were more than 6,000 digital examinations processed at forensic laboratories across the nation.
Eric Demopoulos, a Santa Ana police corporal assigned as a forensic examiner to the lab, said that in 2009 he was able to recover a deleted video that showed a father molesting his daughter.
“The only physical evidence in the entire case is a recovered deleted 23-second video clip, and likely may not have been prosecutable without it,” Demopoulos said.
In a Santa Ana gang-related murder, a man questioned by police denied knowing the owner of a vehicle used in the crime or how his fingerprints got on the vehicle.
But his laptop told a different story.
Demopoulos said an examination of the laptop revealed the man accessed The Orange County Register’s website to read an article about the gang-related murder and then searched jail records on the Orange County Sheriff’s Department’s website for the vehicle owner’s name.
“The only article the computer accessed happened to be the only article where the name was not published, defeating a possible defense that someone read the in-custody name in the article,” Demopoulos said.
The agencies committed to staff the lab: FBI, the Orange County District Attorney’s Office, the Orange County Sheriff’s Department, the California Department of Toxic Substance Control, and the Anaheim, Santa Ana, Irvine, Westminster, Newport Beach and Fullerton police departments.
“This partnership pools our limited resources to fight cyber crime and stay one step ahead of criminals,” said District Attorney Tony Rackauckas. “Gang members use wireless devices and the Internet to support their criminal organizations and pedophiles hide their pornography and use all kinds of external drives to hide what they are doing.”
Laboratory Director Jason G. Weiss said the lab will enable faster processing of evidence. Forensic examiners will search for deleted or damaged file information in digital devices such as cell phones, external hard drives and computers.
The lab hosted a tour for reporters Wednesday and displayed gadgets used in crimes: USB drives disguised as casino chips, watches and a phone wall jack.
“These devices are used to conceal pornography from family and friends,” said Tom Fullerton, a Fullerton police detective assigned to the lab.
The laboratory will serve 250 law enforcement agencies in seven counties and will provide training to detectives from those agencies.
Contact the writer: 714-704-3709 or desalazar@ocregister.com
Watch video from the new lab:
Article source: http://www.ocregister.com/news/lab-282941-orange-laboratory.html
Category: Cyber Crime
