Free DME & DFIR Resources

This brief (approx. 9min.) introduction into the world of digital video evidence is intended to provide law enforcement professionals with a better understanding of the basic concepts and related issues.  It was geared towards first responders, who in many cases are the ones initially seizing video evidence.

The AFMA Board of Directors has recently completed a draft of the Bylaws for the organization. This is available on the AFMA network at http://theafma.ning.com/forum/topics/bylaws-for-the-afma for comment. This draft document will be available for comment for 30 days - any suggestions for updates or additions must be submitted within this timeframe. We ask that if you do submit changes or additions please write them in a form that can be easily amended to the document. For example, a change or addition should be submitted as: “Section 15.2 Any changes or additions will be written in the form of the document.”

MEDIA COURTOUSE — Tahmir Craig is too short to have been the man who shot and killed a minister’s son in broad daylight last Memorial Day in Chester.

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"I feel so lucky to get to be the person to thank you..., on behalf of a world of people seeking free knowledge." - Wikipedia Executive Director

Members helping members.  Let's do this!

I donated to Wikipedia again today as they're in the middle of another fundraiser.  They're an independent, ad-Free non-profit.  No sleezy marketing, covert data collection, persuasive technologies to get or keep you, etc.  Very similar to what I've always tried to do with my websites and resources online. 

LEVA wrapped up their weeklong video evidence symposium and 2008 annual training conference in Orlando yesterday, and they've announced four newly certified analysts. Michael Klein, Lorraine Nagy, Michael Ornelas and Michael Plaxton are now among those who are LEVA Certified Forensic Video Analysts.

Western Digital has announced what it said is a nanotechnology breakthrough that will allow the company to double data storage capacity on hard disk drives (HDD).

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Turns out, pretty damn fast. Way faster than I would, on anything, let alone a croch rocket.

Many of my favorite memories of my time in Broome County involve Harry. Like when he and I where taking hang gliding classes together in the evenings, and those dark & early morning hours on the weekend.

My favorite though was almost dying with him, which I would gladly do to this day, if given an option of how to go out. We were riding motorcycles. Enough said.

Okay, maybe not enough. You should know that my career as an amateur daredevil started very young. I began riding our Honda 50 at 5 years old, and just kept trying to think of more spectacular ways to nearly kill myself from then on.

Harry has me beat. Hands down.

Our Executive office spoke with Harry about us riding motorcycles together, taking hang gliding lessons together, etcetera.  Thier comment to him was:

"There's a reason the President & the Vice President don't ride in the same vehicle together, Harry."

I'm looking to pick up an HD camcorder disguised as a contact lens which accepts microSD behind my earlobe, but I'm not finding anything.  Go figure.  Until then, I'm thinking of picking up an HD pocket camcorder.  You know, something the size of the Flip but in HD.

Still image capability isn't that important to me for this thing, but I would like decent 720p HD video under various typical lighting conditions (e.g. nothing extreme).  SDHC storage would be ideal.

To be honest I was thinking a fully decked out RED rig until my wife walked by, shook her head and smiled.  I don't think she even knew that I started my search looking for a sub $300 pocket camcorder, and ended up looking at a camera rig that would cost about as much as our last car. What I can say is that I'm pretty sure she was thinking "I dare you, you silly little man." 😄

Apple has released the anticipated OS X 10.6.7 update, after weeks of developer build seeds that were issued with no new features or fixes. The update is available in the normal versions of delta and combo updaters for both the client and server versions of OS X, and should be available via Software Update for most people. This update is especially important for owners of the new 2011 MacBook Pro systems because it addresses a graphics bug that caused hangs and crashes under heavy graphics load.

Read more: 
http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-13727_7-20045613-263.html#ixzz1HIA7YZN5

(Credit: Amazon) The scarcity of hard disk drives will only get worse in the coming weeks and months, according to an analyst at Piper Jaffray.

"We could run out of drives by the end of November," Piper Jaffray analyst Gus Richard said in an interview Tuesday while discussing the shortage in the wake of the severe flooding in Thailand, where roughly half of the world's production of HDDs takes place.

FULL STORY:
http://m.cnet.com/Article.rbml?nid=57320282&cid=null&bcid=&bid=-64

Tableau President to Lead Dedicated Business Unit Focused on Forensic Software and Hardware

PASADENA, Calif., May 10, 2010 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Guidance Software, Inc. (NASDAQ: GUID) today announced it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire substantially all of the assets of Tableau, LLC, a privately-held developer and manufacturer of computer forensic hardware. This acquisition extends Guidance Software's existing leadership in computer forensics technology by combining software with hardware for a complete forensic framework for the law enforcement, legal and corporate communities.

Read the complete press release: http://investors.guidancesoftware.com/releaseDetail.cfm?ReleaseID=468120

If you plan on buying a Blu-ray player in 2011, don't be surprised if the back panel is lacking a component video output. A surprising number of mainstream 2011 Blu-ray players, (such as the Panasonic DMP-BDT210, Samsung BD-D5700, LG BD670, to name a few) are omitting the red, green, and blue video jacks, which means buyers will have to rely on HDMI for high-def Blu-ray video signals.
It's all about AACS

We can't blame manufacturers for omitting the component out of new players. For one, it's not a huge loss, as the vast majority of buyers will be using the HDMI output for video. But there's another issue: even the new Blu-ray players that are including component video connections will only output 480i signals, rather than high-def 1080i.

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Hard to believe that next week's 2011 LEVA Training Conference is already upon us. I'll be out in Coeur d'Alene all next week, and I'll be giving a presentation on the AVI file format and VirtualDub at the conference late Thursday afternoon. There are tons of great training sessions going all week long. Hope to see you there!