Juvenile Justice Agencies

This course provides students with the fundamental knowledge and skills they need to investigate crimes involving virtual currency. Instructors explain foundational concepts like the characteristics of money, virtual currency, and cryptocurrency. Blockchain technology, proof work, and proof of stake are covered; and students learn how industry-leading cryptocurrencies (Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Monero) work and how they differ from each other. Finally, students learn investigative techniques for tracking and documenting transactions; and best practices for seizing and securing cryptocurrency.

*Virtual currency basics. History of money and of virtual currency. Categorizing virtual currency.
*Blockchain. History of the blockchain. Understanding different protocols.
*Cryptocurrencies in detail. Bitcoin, Ethereum, Monero and other privacy coins.
*Investigative techniques. Seizing virtual currency; tracking transactions through the blockchain; documenting investigative results.

This course covers the acquisition, examination, and analysis of many types of financial records, including bank statements and checks, wire transfer records, and business records. Topics include recognizing and investigating common indicators of fraud, using spreadsheets to facilitate analysis and pattern recognition, and financial profiling. There is a strong focus on presenting financial evidence in multiple modalities: spreadsheet data outputs, graphic representations, and written/oral presentations.

*Introduction to analysis. Best practices. Finding patterns. Indicators of fraud. Presenting your findings.
*Financial records. Bank records. Business documents.
*Financial profiling. Methods of profiling. Reasons to create a profile. Creating a profile.
*Hands-on experience. Work a mock financial case as part of an investigative team.

An effective financial investigation can disrupt terrorism organizations and interrupt, deter, or even stop operational terrorism activities before they can begin. In this three-day course, students develop an understanding of how financial systems are used to support terrorism activities and transnational criminal organizations. Students will work with tools and methods to investigate the manipulation of financial, communication, and business systems used for illicit purposes. Students will learn how to work with suspicious activity reports, crucial financial records such as Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications (SWIFT) messaging, and records used in banking and money services businesses. They will also learn how to gather information and evidence on other means of value transfer methods associated with money laundering, the black-market peso and forms of trade-based money laundering, hawala, and other alternate remittance systems, and virtual assets (cryptocurrency).

This course provides expert guidance in the skills law enforcement officers need to conduct successful online investigations. Topics include IP addresses and domains, an overview of currently popular social media platforms, best practices for building an undercover profile, foundational knowledge related to the dark web, and the use of the dark web as an investigative tool. Instructors demonstrate both open-source and commercially-available investigative tools for social engineering, information gathering, and artifacts related to social media; as well as automated utilities to capture information and crawl websites.

*Internet basics. IP address assignment; resolving domains and IP addresses; networking overview.
*Popular sites. Facebook, Twitter, KiK Messenger, Snapchat, Instagram, tumblr, and more.
*The dark web. Surface, deep, and dark web; how data flows through the internet. Who uses the dark web and how?
*Tor. How to access Tor; how Tor traffic works; how a Tor Hidden Service works; installing and configuring the Tor Browser Bundle.