Investigative Computer Forensics: The Practical Guide for Lawyers, Accountants, Investigators, and Business Executives

CHAPTER 4

Investigative Fundamentals

This chapter deals with some of the primary investigative fundamentals that are required to develop a sound investigative plan and to achieve success in the fact-finding mission with which you are charged or with which you are charging your computer forensic investigators. In the classic investigative world, long before the advent of computers, when investigators were required to review volumes upon volumes of paper data and research material from public records in halls of administration and also were required to trail suspects physically, many of the attributes of a successful investigator could be easily defined.

The Investigative Mind-Set

Among the primary attributes of a successful investigator is a natural sense of curiosity, having a desire to understand things that are out of your reach and to learn the truth to questions that come across your field of vision. These are essential elements of the investigative mind-set. Suspicion is also an important aspect of the investigative mind-set. Good investigators have natural suspicion of things that are presented to them, stories that are told to them, or even the observations that they themselves make. The five senses of the human experience allow investigators to observe. This ability to observe and to have an acute sense of observation is a key ingredient to being an effective investigator, regardless if it's in the days of Sherlock Holmes or in the twenty-first century, when one must observe ...