Law Enforcement

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.

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.

This course introduces the information and techniques law enforcement personnel need to safely and methodically collect and preserve digital evidence at a crime scene. Topics include recognizing potential sources of digital evidence; planning and executing a digital evidence-based seizure; and the preservation, packaging, documentation, and transfer of digital evidence.

*Prepare. Prepare to respond to an incident or crime scene where digital evidence may be present.
*Identify. Learn tow to identify relevant sources of digital evidence in an ever-evolving landscape.
*Collect. Learn the proper methods of digital evidence collection.
*Preserve. Build upon the three previous principles to ensure valid and legal preservation of digital evidence can occur.

This intermediate spreadsheeting course uses Microsoft Excel to assess and organize data in an electronic format. The class is designed for learners who have experience using Excel and who want to increase their spreadsheeting knowledge and skills. Topics include text functions, absolute referencing, date and time functions, flash fill, handling formula errors, VLOOKUP, dynamic arrays, and data validation. The course combines live demonstrations, instructor-led exercises, and independent student exercises.

This course covers basic intelligence writing and briefing principles as well as methods for effective and clear intelligence sharing. Topics covered include creative and critical thinking, critical reading skills, source evaluation, privacy and civil rights, intelligence writing style and structure, and generating and presenting intelligence briefings. With guidance from experienced experts, students gain hands-on experience by working through data sets based on real cases to produce intelligence products. Instructors and peers provide feedback on briefings and reports produced and presented in class.

*Foundational skills. Creative thinking. Critical thinking. Critical reading.
*Information sources. Identify sources of intelligence information. Evaluate sources for validity and reliability.
*Analytical reports. Develop a structured and actionable analytical report based on a data set given in class.
*Privacy considerations. Ensure protection of privacy and civil rights while producing intelligence products.
*Briefings. Construct and deliver an intelligence briefing based on a data set given in class.

This course prepares students to identify various artifacts typically located in property lists and SQLite databases on MacOS-based computers, as well as learn how to perform forensic analysis. Students gain hands-on practical experience writing basic SQL queries and using to analyze operating system artifacts that includes, but is not limited to, user login passwords, FaceTime, messages, mail, contacts, calendars, reminders, notes, photos, Safari, Google Chrome, and Mozilla Firefox.

This course promotes a multi-agency approach to the problem of financial exploitation of senior citizens. Topics include working with senior victims, examining documents like bank records and power of attorney, and resources for investigation and community awareness. Detailed examination of a case study from initial complaint to prosecution reinforces and illustrates the course content. With a dual focus on financial abuse by trusted persons and common scams aimed at seniors, the course introduces senior-specific investigative skills while facilitating networking and cooperation that can extend out of the classroom and into real cases.

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.

This course provides the fundamental knowledge and skills required to acquire forensic backup images of commonly encountered forms of digital evidence (Microsoft Windows based computers and external storage devices) in a forensically sound manner. Presentations and hands-on practical exercises cover topics on storage media and how data is stored, the forensic acquisition process, tool validation, hardware and software write blockers, forensic backup image formats, and multiple forensic acquisition methods. Students will use third party tools, both free and commercial, that are currently used by practitioners in the field.

This course provides an overview of the actions investigators can take at the outset of a financial crime investigation. Students learn to ask critical questions, gather documentation, and analyze information for leads. Topics include obtaining and working with financial records, red flags in financial cases, money laundering, investigative strategies for different types of financial crimes, and commingled funds.