UK Cops Want "Breathalyzers" For PCs

An anonymous reader writes "One of the UK's top cyber cops, detective superintendent Charlie McMurdie, says the top brass want to develop the equivalent of a breathalyzer for computers, a simple tool that could be plugged into a machine during a raid and retrieve evidence of illegal activity. McMurdie said the device was needed because of a record number of PCs were being seized by police and because the majority of cops don't have the skills to forensically analyse a computer."

Comments

So they want GOV spyware?

[Joe The Dragon]

So they want GOV spyware? They will still need people to look at the data.

Re:So they want GOV spyware?

[blueg3]

You don't get the point. Currently all analysis of computers must be done by computer forensic specialists, who are relatively expensive and limited in number. So, say you are investigating Joe Smith, who has 3 computers, a PDA, and a cell phone. You deliver all these to the forensic analysts. At least half a year passes before you get any information from them. At that point, the information is only really useful in a trial, but not in the investigation.

They want something where cheaper people in greater supply (i.e., regular officers) can, in a forensically-valid manner, look for preliminary information so that they can take advantage of it in the investigation and so they can limit the evidence they send for forensic analysis (e.g., the one device out of those five that was used in the crime).

Re:Right

[theaveng]

Well put.

But the governments of this world routinely ignore law (obtain warrant naming specific evidence desired) and instead do exactly what you described - go on a fishing expedition. "Well we came here to get marijuana, but instead we discovered porn on your PC, so you go to jail buddy."

They do this same ____ in the U.S. with random searches of cars. They are supposed to be looking for illegal immigrants, but instead they bring in the dogs and have them sniff for marijuana/cocaine. Then they arrest you.

This shouldn't be allowed.

I can see

[zehaeva]

There is going to be a large amount of demand for "Computer Forensics Specialist" in the near future. Too bad the majority of them are going to go to devry thinking they're going to learn everything they need to.

Re:Right

[thesqlizer]

I don't recall where (or if) the US Supreme Court handed down a decision on the concept of "Are computer files more like what's in your brain or in a file cabinet."

IMHO, searching a computer is akin to searching someone during questioning.

Questioning someone who has been Mirandized: fine.
Going through their belongings with a search warrant to find something specific: fine.
Going through a computer willy-nilly on a fishing expedition: not fine.

Re:Outlaw encryption

[orzetto]

What happens if you "forget" the key? Like this: "Your honour, I once experimented with encryption, but could not understand how it worked. The files must be leftovers of that installation. I never used them and they must be empty." How can they prove you are lying, short of breaking the encryption and finding the evidence?

Interpretation

[Capt James McCarthy]

It costs too much money for the Police to pay quality IT Forensics folks. The police want a simple green, yellow, or red light that the police can follow, that is closed source and has it's AI written by policy makers to decide what is legal or questionable.

Re:Right

[CannonballHead]

Doesn't this kinda depend? Just because you found something else while looking for your actual thought doesn't mean you have to IGNORE it. If you came looking for credit card fraud and found, say, illegal hacking activity, should they just ignore it? If you go into a house looking for marijuana and you find people being tortured, do you have to go back to the station, get a warrant for looking into that, and then come back?

Now, if they pull you over for "presumably" running a stop sign and sniff your car, that's different. On the other hand, since illegal immigrants and drugs seem to go together, since drug trafficking and immigrant trafficking is a similar thing (smuggling), I don't actually see a problem is searching for both at the same time.

I'm not saying they should be allowed to just randomly show up and search your house without giving a reason, by the way.

It's a fine line between hampering catching criminals by giving "too many rights" and stepping over the bounds of innocent until proven guilty...

Re:Right

[Firehed]

At least in the US, evidence found against you found in an illegal search* cannot be used against you. If the search was legal (warrant attained or reasonable suspicion of wrongdoing), then it's your fault for having done whatever other stuff you get hit with, regardless of why you/your home/vehicle was searched. Don't confuse this with secondary offenses, like not having your seat belt on in many states (they can't pull you over specifically for that, but can add it to the ticket).

* if they can see the bag of weed (or whatever) on your back seat through the window, not only is it legal for them to arrest you for it, but it also gives them reasonable suspicion to search the rest of the vehicle without attaining a warrant, even if you protest.

IANAL, YMMV, laws vary by state, etc. And all bets tend to be off at border stops, especially internationally. As far as I'm aware, they have the legal (USA PATRIOT act legal, anyways) right to search your vehicle entirely at any international border.

But back to the topic at hand, if your computer is legitimately siezed, I think you should at least be able to know what processes were used to search for X when Y was found. If they want to arrest you for possession of goat porn, and then they find CP, you should be able to find out that the latter came up when they did a general search for porn, rather than when they explicitly searched for it. Or if they find pirated media when searching for CP, which would be a lot harder to accidentally find by the same 'legit' search. It'll never happen, and good luck auditing the police's methods even if you had the right to do so. Just encrypt all of your crap, and don't have illegal stuff.

My 2c

Re:Right

[Shakrai]

Which is probably why there are so few elaborate bank-jobs

And I could actually understand the motivation for an elaborate bank-job. You disable the alarm, tunnel into the bank, break open the vault and walk away with a cool million or so. I could get behind that. A million bucks is worth the chance of going to prison......

What isn't worth the chance of going to prison is the dumbass who holds up the bank with a gun and walks away with a lousy $10,000. Even worse is the dumbass who holds up the gas station with a gun and walks away with less than $100. Clearly they didn't do a proper cost benefit analysis ;)

Re:Right

[LunaticTippy]

Yeah, the 7-11 bandits that get <$10 plus some beer and cigarettes crack me up. A lot of crime seems very inefficient. $200 for a new car window, $200 for a new stereo, $200 for the dashboard repairs, and the thief got $20.

I knew a bank robber. I didn't know he was knocking over banks at the time, but he later was in a long distance high speed chase ending in suicide by cop. Pretty surprising to everyone that knew him. I think he got ground down by his circumstances for too long. He spent so many years having to scrimp and do without it made him crazy. I remember him going out to eat a lot and buying little gifts for his friends and seeming happier than usual. I guess for him a lousy $60k (assuming he got $10k per bank) was worth dying for.

The truly weird thing was when he got away from the 5th bank it was very close. He was driving on medians and shoulders, through fields like a maniac during rush hour with dozens of cops on his tail. Somehow he got away and instead of ditching the car and going straight he laid low for a month and did it again.

Re:Now, THIS would be entertaining...

[the_womble]

I'm just waiting for the day when a botnet herder decides to find out the answer to the question of "what will the government do when *everyone* is a criminal?"... and malware sends a "care package" to 1,000,000+ computers, consisting of illegal content {child porn / whatever) - then reports the IP addresses to the authorities.

If the sort of people who ran botnets were the sort of people who want better laws and police, that would happen. I rather think that is the last thing they want.

What is more likely (if it is not happening already) is that more targeted hacks are being used to plant material on computers, hidden where are non-knowledgeable user would not easily find it, and then blackmailing them. A few files could be placed in open view to prove that the threat was real - or perhaps a random illegal image could be popped up at intervals to keep the pressure up.

Most people would be too scared to get help, and would roll over.

Re:Be careful though.

[ancientt]

I was watching cops (not a regular viewer but was being sociable) and saw a cop search a car claiming a "furtive gesture" as probable cause. I could hardly believe it, here was a guy who knew he was being filmed who apparently decided that showing his ability to get around the need for a warrant was going to be taken as a good thing by viewers. What sticks with me isn't the injustice of it all, it was that a potential jury of peers sitting around watching TV seemed to support the action.