Development and initial user evaluation of a virtual crime scene simulator including digital evidence

Abstract

Imagine the following scenario: an inexperienced law enforcement officer enters a crime scene and - on finding a USB key on a potential suspect - inserts it into a nearby Windows desktop computer hoping to find some information which may help an ongoing investigation. The desktop crashes and all data on the USB key and on the Windows desktop has now been potentially compromised. However, the law enforcement officer in question is using a Virtual Crime Scene Simulator and has just learned a valuable lesson. This paper discusses the development and initial user evaluation of a Virtual Crime Scene Simulator that includes the ability to interact with and perform live triage of commonly-found digital devices. Based on our experience of teaching digital evidence handling, we aimed to create a realistic virtual environment that integrates many different aspects of the digital and physical crime scene processing, such as physical search activities, triage of digital devices, note taking and form filling, interaction with suspects at the scene, as well as search team training.