Super Secret Password

One of the best parts of being a professor is preparing courses before the semester begins. It’s a time to reflect on the last time you taught the course and make improvements/enhancements in the content. One of the fun projects I did last year was scoped an analysis (and created evidence) surrounding the Wikileaks case. Here was the project scope:

You are tasked with investigating a military computer system that has been alleged to be apart of the recent classified information disclosure to the infamous Wikileaks website. The computer system you’re examining was permitted to have classified information and you can determine if a file was classified by following the below:

·         Confidential files have [CO] in the file name

·         Secret files have [SC] in the file name

Your Scope:

The users accessing this system had no expectation of privacy. Your expected deliverables are:    

1)     Determine if any classified files were sent/saved/distributed to any other digital device

2)     Determine if any user on this computer communicated/researched regarding how to distribute/share/obtain the information on the leaked information described on the Wikileaks website

3)     Provide a recommendation for other data sources / suspects / email accounts /aliases to consider in this investigation

Students had to examine evidence and provide a comprehensive report. The best part was trying to get students to take their analysis to the next level, that is, beyond what was taught in the course. As digital forensic examiners, we will always encounter something new and we need to be ready/prepared to figure things out. I was pleased to see some of the students do this — and even more pleased to hear that some of those Juniors had amazing internships this summer and most of them already have job offers — before they even entered their Senior year.

This term in Operating System Forensics we will be spending a lot of time examining a few digital devices we’ve been building and “crafting” for the past 6 months. It’s key for a digital forensic professor teach both theory and practice and there is no better way, in my opinion than to build custom assessments for each class so students are not only engaged, but excited to learn.

Needless to say, I’m excited to start teaching on Monday 🙂

Last May (2011) I rewrote the undergraduate digital forensic curriculum at Champlain College. I collaborated with the many people to complete this monumental task including but not limited to Mike Wilkinson, Cristian Balan, Ali Rafieymehr, Michelle Miller, Jim Hoag and others who will be named at a future date (we are waiting to release these names).

This Fall is the first incoming class to experience the newly designed material. Current students will also be able to take advantage of the new curriculum as its developed (we plan to have all of the courses ready by Fall 2013).

The new curriculum will include newly designed content which will be updated each semester to stay current/leading edge. One of the most exciting parts of the curriculum are the 10 (that’s right. ten) digital forensic classes. Don’t confuse these digital forensic classes for “networking” or “security” courses either, these are full blown digital forensic focused classes. Below is a list of the new courses:

1. Cyber Crime – Criminal and Civil Investigations
2. Introduction to Digital Forensics
3. Digital Forensic Tool Evaluation
4. Anti-Forensics and Network Forensics
5. File System Forensics
6. Operating System Forensics
7. Mobile Device Forensics
8. E-Discovery and Data Analytics
9. Advanced Practice in Digital Forensics
10. Capstone (Senior Thesis)
11. Digital Forensic Internship (optional)