True Crime Tuesday - Kriminalwissenschaften im Gespräch

“Solving Crimes with Digital Forensics” with Jeff Walker

Jeff Walker is a Professor and Chair of the Department of Criminal Justice at the University of Alabama, Birmingham. In this capacity, he works with and conducts research with researchers in physical forensics (chemistry such as gunshot residue and biology such as DNA analyses) and digital forensics (such as credit card fraud, gang violence, and terrorism). Prior to this position, Dr. Walker served as a Special Agent in the US military specializing as a computer forensic examiner in major felony crime investigations. He is currently working on blending physical and digital forensics and the study of law and justice into a Crime Science program at his university.

This talk will look at some of the ways digital forensics techniques are helping solve crimes. In the 21st Century, almost all crimes leave digital footprints. Even simple crimes such as burglary often have traces of criminal actions such as phone calls, emails, and texts between the criminals. Other crimes have much more digital information to them, like human trafficking where the people who are trafficked are “advertised” on the internet. Gangs often post pictures of gang members on social media where they are displaying guns, drugs, money, and other parts of crime. And some crimes are almost exclusively digital in focus, such as credit card fraud where credit card numbers are stolen through hacking or phishing and then sold on internet sites. This talk will show some examples of these crimes and show how digital forensics can be used to investigate and solve crimes. Real-world examples will be discussed, and the future of the study of digital forensics as a crime-solving area of study will be addressed.