This month will be busy, since there are several deadlines, and of course the conference of the AAFS in Chicago, where I will organize the Forensic Multimedia workshop and give one paper. It is always an excellent event, with good networking and discussion with other forensic scientists.
Last month I received a question for making tweets on forensics, and some people thought I was discussing actual casework. I will never discuss on the blog or anyware in public on casework were I or any of my colleagues am working on, and which are still in the court, without prior permission. Only forensic meetings and events that are public will be discussed, and of course R&D which is open. The advantage of a blog compared to a tweet is that you can add more text to it, so this kind of misunderstanding are less likely to happen here.
On the forens-l list that I host there are some discussions on the NAS report, and it is good to see that many issues are handled there. Since I moderate the list, the posting improve. In the past I started hosting this unmoderated list, and then it appeared that some discussions did not go well. So I started some moderation, and it appears to work better.
Sunday, January 30, 2011
Sunday, January 16, 2011
January 2011
At the beginning of January I went to Tunesia for one week, since the Sahara climate works well against my astma, which is worst in winter. It was the first time that I experienced employees of the hotel striking and demonstrating for the hotel, against goverment. Later on when visiting the Medina in Sousse and Tunis, we saw some riots, so it appeared the start of the election of a new president and government appeared this week. I hope there will be peace again, and perhaps they can use parts of the Sahara for energy production with solar panels in the future, if possible of course.
Also the start of a new year, gives also new experiences. We had a kaizen meeting from lean six sigma for making our work more efficient. So first we are analysing the process. It appears to work well in forensic laboratories to have less backlog, of course in combination with a Service Level Agreement.
Of course also working on some cases, and it appeared I had a backlog in reviewing papers, so I had to do some work on this. Also new year celebrations of my work, and of course new planning and new ideas.
In February I will attend the American Academy of Forensic Science meeting in Chicago, and chair a workshop, give a presentation, and also be in meetings for the Forensic Science Foundation, and to meetings as Director of the Digital and Multimedia Sciences Section. So also some preparations for this event.
Also the start of a new year, gives also new experiences. We had a kaizen meeting from lean six sigma for making our work more efficient. So first we are analysing the process. It appears to work well in forensic laboratories to have less backlog, of course in combination with a Service Level Agreement.
Of course also working on some cases, and it appeared I had a backlog in reviewing papers, so I had to do some work on this. Also new year celebrations of my work, and of course new planning and new ideas.
In February I will attend the American Academy of Forensic Science meeting in Chicago, and chair a workshop, give a presentation, and also be in meetings for the Forensic Science Foundation, and to meetings as Director of the Digital and Multimedia Sciences Section. So also some preparations for this event.
Sunday, December 26, 2010
December 2010 (2)
At the end of December we heard of course the bad news of the Forensic Science Service that closes in 2012 due to losses. Since it is the biggest provider of England and Wales (60 percent) owned by the government it is a question what happens with the experience of the forensic scientists. Of course I also heard the bad news from many colleagues who work there, and since they were very active within the forensic communities, such as ENFSI, we will also see changes in these law enforcement forensic communities. Perhaps we learn from what happened there, however perhaps future will give them also new opportunities.
Also in the Netherlands it is investigated what happens if we are working in a market as a forensic service. This report is balanced, since it also provides insight in the issues that can arise in a market. An abstract in English is provided on the website, and describes three scenarios from the full government service to the free market solution for a crime lab with strict market control with a regulator.
An issue with forensic science in a crime lab is that there is not many jobs, and certainly not if budget cuts are in place. There are many students interested in forensic science as such, also due to the CSI effect, so we see a mismatch between the number of jobs and the available jobs. If we take England and Wales as and example, the Forensic Science Service has 1300 scientists and figures state that it is 60 percent of the market. The population of England and Wales is 53 million, so it means that aproximately 40 scientist per million of inhibitants. If we assume that forensic scientist stay on their job on avarage for 20 years, this means 2 vacancies per million inhibitants. Most European countries have less forensic scientists, so the number of vacancies for crime labs is limited, at least in crime labs.
Also in the Netherlands it is investigated what happens if we are working in a market as a forensic service. This report is balanced, since it also provides insight in the issues that can arise in a market. An abstract in English is provided on the website, and describes three scenarios from the full government service to the free market solution for a crime lab with strict market control with a regulator.
An issue with forensic science in a crime lab is that there is not many jobs, and certainly not if budget cuts are in place. There are many students interested in forensic science as such, also due to the CSI effect, so we see a mismatch between the number of jobs and the available jobs. If we take England and Wales as and example, the Forensic Science Service has 1300 scientists and figures state that it is 60 percent of the market. The population of England and Wales is 53 million, so it means that aproximately 40 scientist per million of inhibitants. If we assume that forensic scientist stay on their job on avarage for 20 years, this means 2 vacancies per million inhibitants. Most European countries have less forensic scientists, so the number of vacancies for crime labs is limited, at least in crime labs.
Friday, November 26, 2010
December 2010
From the last posting on possible errors in forensic science, I received several reactions for methods to reduce errors caused by humans by software. Of course that is a good approach, however one should include it in the whole system.
One issue we also see is the way the conclusions and the report are interpreted by the readers such as judges, juries and prosecutors. Also the combination of conclusions from different sources of evidence is important. For this a Bayesian approach can also be used, which is logically correct. An issue remains that the readers not always read the same, and interpretation by the readers of the report can also give confusion. For that reason, it is important to have good education on statistics, and write clear reports. And there we have the paradox that by writing more logically reports it is less intuitive for the reader, especially in detailed technical reports.
Currently also working on my website http://forensic.to/forensic.html , since sometimes information has to be checked and rechecked again. It seems many persons also use older versions, and ask for updates of these. This week I had to stay at home due to an injury at my knee, so I had time to read articles, reviewing them, and also making phone calls. Working at the computer was less ergonomic. Next week I hope to start working again.
One issue we also see is the way the conclusions and the report are interpreted by the readers such as judges, juries and prosecutors. Also the combination of conclusions from different sources of evidence is important. For this a Bayesian approach can also be used, which is logically correct. An issue remains that the readers not always read the same, and interpretation by the readers of the report can also give confusion. For that reason, it is important to have good education on statistics, and write clear reports. And there we have the paradox that by writing more logically reports it is less intuitive for the reader, especially in detailed technical reports.
Currently also working on my website http://forensic.to/forensic.html , since sometimes information has to be checked and rechecked again. It seems many persons also use older versions, and ask for updates of these. This week I had to stay at home due to an injury at my knee, so I had time to read articles, reviewing them, and also making phone calls. Working at the computer was less ergonomic. Next week I hope to start working again.
Thursday, November 11, 2010
November 2010
November started with the organization of the Themadagen Digital Evidence for the Dutch Law Enforcement, were we had 270 participants. Furthermore as always a somewhat busy time, however this month some vacation time (since normally I work during the summer holidays). So going south to Cyprus, with nice weather.
Also thinking on forensic science for law enforcement and commercial services and issues like certification. In the Netherlands they are working on a register for certified forensic scientist, which is in the law.
There are several opinions on this development. An opinion is that forensic science for crime cases is not good as a commercial service, since it might cause issues with bias to the client who pays for the services. Others think this can be prevented within the law system by making judges, prosecutors and juries if applicable aware of this issue, and that it will also be solved within a market, as in the UK, with a forensic regulator by using appropiate scientific quality standards.
An issue which we see in England and Wales, is that the police will do more forensic work themselves, so there is no market anymore. In Germany and other countries it appears to work well with private experts.
However, with any system all people should be aware of objective forensic services, and for this reason all research for objectivation of forensic evidence is impportant, were now much effort is spend by the forensic community, in funding of research by the National Institute of Justice and of the FP7 of the European Union.
Also thinking on forensic science for law enforcement and commercial services and issues like certification. In the Netherlands they are working on a register for certified forensic scientist, which is in the law.
There are several opinions on this development. An opinion is that forensic science for crime cases is not good as a commercial service, since it might cause issues with bias to the client who pays for the services. Others think this can be prevented within the law system by making judges, prosecutors and juries if applicable aware of this issue, and that it will also be solved within a market, as in the UK, with a forensic regulator by using appropiate scientific quality standards.
An issue which we see in England and Wales, is that the police will do more forensic work themselves, so there is no market anymore. In Germany and other countries it appears to work well with private experts.
However, with any system all people should be aware of objective forensic services, and for this reason all research for objectivation of forensic evidence is impportant, were now much effort is spend by the forensic community, in funding of research by the National Institute of Justice and of the FP7 of the European Union.
Saturday, October 23, 2010
October 2010 (2)
This week I went to Dalian, China to BIT's 1st forensic conference . It was a very nice venue and there were several tracks in parrellel. The opening ceremony was indeed impressing, also with Henry Lee, who told he was born in Taiwan, and also emphasised the importance of search strategies in forensic science.
Dr. Gerry LaPorte from the National Institute of Justice, emphasised also the culture within the forensic laboratories in the past that if you would make an error you could forget your carreer in forensic science. This is not good, since there is no room then to learn from past experiences, and improve the system. Also the implications of the NAS report will lead to more research to objectivation.
The conference had many good papers in objectivation, from speaker analysis to handwriting, cybercrime investigation to facial comparison and the limitations that exist there. It was good to see that there is more research on measuring the system and the error rate in forensic science, as well as having statistical analysis for improvement, also with the use of likelihood ratio calculations.
Dalian was also a very nice city to visit, near the waterfront, and with a fast developing center, with good transportation options, and excellent service. The confrence itself was also good for many new contacts within forensic science, and will also be organized next year.
Dr. Gerry LaPorte from the National Institute of Justice, emphasised also the culture within the forensic laboratories in the past that if you would make an error you could forget your carreer in forensic science. This is not good, since there is no room then to learn from past experiences, and improve the system. Also the implications of the NAS report will lead to more research to objectivation.
The conference had many good papers in objectivation, from speaker analysis to handwriting, cybercrime investigation to facial comparison and the limitations that exist there. It was good to see that there is more research on measuring the system and the error rate in forensic science, as well as having statistical analysis for improvement, also with the use of likelihood ratio calculations.
Dalian was also a very nice city to visit, near the waterfront, and with a fast developing center, with good transportation options, and excellent service. The confrence itself was also good for many new contacts within forensic science, and will also be organized next year.
Friday, October 01, 2010
October 2010
Last month the excellent organized meeting in Moscow of our ENFSI Forensic IT Working group. Many interesting presentations, also from Russian companies in forensic software.
I had also a court case were I had to testify in the week of the meeting, so it was a busy month, since there was also many casework which had to be finished. Also we had an excellent student who developed new and faster algorithms for PRNU comparison. And another student who did very good validation studies for PRNU (camera identification based on Photo Response Non Uniformity).
Also I received a request for posting 20 books you should read. Some of them are very good, however I miss at least a book on digital evidence, since this is becoming more important.
Currently there is also a call for project on forensic investigation of digital evidence from the European Commission in FP7, which attracts several parties.
I am also chairing the organisation of the education days in digital evidence for the Dutch police in November. The program is nearly ready, and it appears there are many new interesting developments.
I had also a court case were I had to testify in the week of the meeting, so it was a busy month, since there was also many casework which had to be finished. Also we had an excellent student who developed new and faster algorithms for PRNU comparison. And another student who did very good validation studies for PRNU (camera identification based on Photo Response Non Uniformity).
Also I received a request for posting 20 books you should read. Some of them are very good, however I miss at least a book on digital evidence, since this is becoming more important.
Currently there is also a call for project on forensic investigation of digital evidence from the European Commission in FP7, which attracts several parties.
I am also chairing the organisation of the education days in digital evidence for the Dutch police in November. The program is nearly ready, and it appears there are many new interesting developments.
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