Girlie’s Xmas Annual – Part I

Hello World!  

And welcome to Girlie’s Xmas Xtravaganza !

Well, the Festive Season is upon us and Girlie Geek Productions has been hard at work to bring you extra lolz.

We freely admit that it’s been far too quiet on this blog recently.

So now (drum roll… ) for your general delectation and delight, we bring you not one, not two but three snippets of humour to help get the party underway

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Colour Mag

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Traditional Forensicator’s Xmas Quiz

Limber up, you Lab rats !  Answer the following questions as honestly as you can then count up your answers and see what category Forensicator you are !

1:  A solicitor calls wanting vital picture evidence off a mobile do you:

a) Tell them it’ll be £700 + VAT and it’ll take 30 days to process.

b) Ask for the make & model and give a truthful prognosis on likely results.

c) Tell them it’ll be 60 quid – just chuck it in a Jiffy bag & post it to the Lab.

2: You hear the Met contract is up for grabs, anyone pitching for it has to do a test case.  Do you:

a) Set the Lab’s best Rottweilers on it whilst charging their time to big-budget clients.

b) Take it too seriously & worry they’ve put Stego on there for a laugh.

c) Con Russ May into thinking it’s a real case & pay him to do it for you.

3: You win a large LE contract. Do you:

a) Sack the staff then get them back in on short contracts to maximise profits.

b) Rejoice for 15 minutes then worry that the weight of work might impact on standards.

c) Grab all the students and wannabies you can get your hands on to populate the mobile lab – they’ll only have to push buttons, anyhow.

4: The following statement describes how your organisation sees digital forensics:

a) It’s a gravy train – charge as much as you can for as little work as possible.

b) We eat, sleep and breathe forensics & have little else in the way of conversation.

c) Forensics? No time for that. Too busy making vacuous comments on Twitter.

5: The annual F3 conference is on.  How do you spend the time?

a) Visiting all the vendors just to hoover up the sweeties and freebies.

b) Virtuously on Day 1, pie-eyed on Day 2 & completely wasted on Day 3.

c) Dolling out booze and forensic goodies to favoured police officers in an attempt to curry favour.

6:  A nice fat civil case comes up but the box for analysis is a MacBook Air.  Do you:

a) Suck your teeth, whinge about how difficult it’s going to be and double your normal quote.

b) Dig MacQuisition out of the storeroom, pronto.

c) Know naff all about Macs but take it on anyway.

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Now check your score:

Mostly As – You are a medium to large scale forensic shop with nice modern offices in a reasonable location and enough contract work coming in to feel smugly secure. Good luck when you lose your main LE contract.

Mostly Bs – You are a small shop constantly taking on too much work for too little money and being way too thorough to cut much profit but you’re happy because you love the job and your clients think you’re heroes.

Mostly Cs – You are Kraptech Forensics.

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Part II coming after the break…

Not Keats and Not Forensics

… But still in the spirit of cocking up the classics and uncovering hidden truths 

Odious Autumn

Season of myths and callow youthfulness

Close-bosom friend of Mr Murdoch’s Sun;

Conspiring with it how to load the press

With tosh the lines that round the royals run;

To bend with glee the rumors and half truths

And fill each page with lurid pix and prose,

To swell their sales, and grab the public gaze

With nubile girls and princes without clothes

And, being ever hungry for more proofs

Cry havoc and let slip their newshound sleuths,

For Summer has o’erbrimmed their dig-dirt craze.

Misreading Palace protocol for a Family Group shot following a right royal piss up the evening before, Prince Harry opts for his Birthday Suit.

The Digital Diary of Samuel Geekys

Read all about it! First in a new series – industry gossip like you’ve never heard it before…

The world of 18th century geekdom as seen through the eyes of the famous diarist, Samuel Geekys.

Tuesday 30 June, 1667

Up, and without my customary shave, I straight to my workstation to see what news may lie in my inboxe. I see that Amazon do despatch ‘Forensicks for Dummies’ with all haste, which pleases me, for I have a presentation in the offing and am glad of material to rip off for the slides which should accompany it. Thence to Twitter, where little changed since last evening, links of no interest and pointless photographs of glasses of beer. It amazeth me that people do bother to post such stuffe and nonsense. Then also their eventide wishes. ‘Goodnight all,‘ and such like. How people fancy that others take a minute interest in their sad little lives! I have, of late, witnessed some even giving a blow-by-blow account of events in ye Worlde cuppe whilst most may easily watch the same for themselves upon wide-screen televisions in their local hostelries or in the comfort of their own homes. Such is the self regard of this age of ours.

No time for Facebook this morrow. Dressed and on with my Periwig and I to the office where I find my colleague, Widget, in poor spirits. He says he hears that our rivals Kraptech have got contracts with certain agents of Lawe Enforcement by doing phone exams at 30l each! Much astounded, I ask him how they do manage it. He tells me they use students part time and they not even having any learning in Forensicks. I say it is the fault of the general attitude, for the Courts do not seem to care how evidence be gained from phones, accepting always the Prosecution report at face value. Yet privily I am troubled that standards are debased in such a fashion. Also that prices are driven down by these unscrupulous knaves. Presently, it will not be worthe a man’s while rising for work in a morning.

Geekys with his iPad

Thence away to clients in the City but I staid vexed by the conversation. Next bleeps my iPhone with news from Transport for London saying ye Circle Line be again up the creek and I standing betimes at Ludgate Circus. I resolve to hail a black carriage, despite the cost. The journey doth not improve my temper for the traffic is jammed solid. Why does my Lord Boris the Mayor not get the blessed lighting system sorted? The worlde knows that his predecessor Livingstone, loving bicycles almost as well as newts, did get the timings altered such that only one or two carriages may pass before all must stop again. Then when the cry went up that the city did move at a crawl, he made it an excuse to bring in ye Congestion Charge. Now have we both the Charge and the traffic problems. Thus do we benefit from the ‘improvements’ of politicians.

Home and again on to Twitter, thinking to post some witty snippet before bed. There I am affronted by the great brags made by others in my profession about how much work they do get. It causes me to laugh, for all do know that the year has been very bad for everyone. These boasters do have a right nerve, for they are the same who phone colleagues to ask prices for covering certain jobs, barter as low as possible then never call back. They surely think us all thicke that we do not know their game, which be only to discover our costs so that they can undercut us.

Pron Crackers

There are many questions which trouble computer examiners as they settle down, with a world-weary sigh, for another long day at the  forensic interface.  Simple worries like, ‘What determines species diversity?’ and ‘Are we alone in the Universe?’ jostle with larger concerns such as, ‘Will there be any chocolate hobnobs left by elevenses?’ and ‘What exactly was that crap I was drinking last night?’

Amongst such nagging imponderables nestle other unanswerable queries, generally associated with the job itself. Since most of us spend inordinate amounts of time trawling through thousands of sexual images, some of these inevitably relate to the astonishing diversity of distaste which is out there.

Here, then, is one such question.  All answers on an e-card…

If there’s MILF why is there not the male equivalent: FILF?  Like the female version, this rather appropriately named new genre would feature the more mature person, with or without posing pouch, in a variety of situations.

Instead of letting it all hang out in the kitchen or over the living room couch (complete with tacky, fake fur throw) your average FILF would be found in his own environment – the garage or perhaps the garden shed.  It’s amazing what you can do with some WD40 and a couple of spark plugs. Or a terracotta plant pot and a bottle of Baby Bio.  There would be no end of erotic symbolism to be found in the greenhouse, too, where easy access to a length of hose and a couple of ripe tomatoes would help redefine the dubious art of the single-entendre.

A prime candidate for FILF

The more adventurous FILF might choose a mixture of masculine metaphors for added piquancy.  Spread-eagled on a Gro Bag, lardy, white flesh glistening with a liberal smear of Swarfega and a monkey wrench held in a meaningful grip, he would drive onlookers wild with unrequited passion.  They would have to have more.  Broadband links would go into melt down as millions of sad, unfulfilled singletons hit the download button, then set up their Limewire to go in search of further titillation from 2 ‘til 5 am.

FILF would burgeon into a multi-million dollar industry and pron masters would compete to produce, new, ever-more vile versions of the style.  Tamer vids, such as ‘Kinky Kev’s Gardening Tips’ and ‘Sexy Simon’s Big End’ would be followed by ‘Mulch Madness’ and ‘Crankshaft Crazy’.  Then, in an attempt to stimulate the jaded consumer palate, would come the nasty hard core.  Home spun, beer-bellied beefcake would rule no more.  The professionals would move in and the whole thing would spiral out of control.

Soon, in Police stations up and down the country, raw shrieks of horror would be heard emanating from the Hi-Tech Crime Unit as the full effect of FILF was felt.  Case-hardened coppers would cringe at the thought of carving out images of smug, balding blokes with impossibly small appendages committing deviant acts at their Black-and-Decker work benches.  Officers would be issued with sick bags as standard and the day-to-day risk of exposure to FILF materials would become a serious health and safety issue.

Yes, then they would cry out for a return to normal abnormality.  For the cosy world of MILF, the comparative safe haven of the degradation of the female.

But the revolting realm of Pron would have changed.  Forever.

The Owl Hunting

More exciting gems are appearing from a secret stash of lost literary works.

Oriental scholars have been astonished by the latest find – a haiku from the hand of the famous poet and painter, Yosa Buson.

An acknowledged master of the ‘one-breath poem’, which is structured in the set form of 17 syllables arranged in a 5-7-5 pattern, Buson wrote at least 20,000 in his lifetime.  Until recently, his subject matter was always thought to have revolved around scenes from nature.

Now it seems clear that he knew and practiced the ancient art of ‘Susido’ – the 18th century Japanese version of digital forensics – spending hours at his bamboo portable, reflecting on the meaning of various artefacts.

This new example of Buson’s extraordinary talent bears his customary hallmark – the description of only one peaceful scene…

The Owl Hunting

Digital secrets,

Hex, ASCII, Metadata,

Lovely by moonlight.

The artist with his bamboo portable

Hidden Hymn

There is something quintessentially British about the unique blend of gusto and gibberish which makes up a Gilbert and Sullivan operetta.  What is less well known, perhaps, is that Arthur Sullivan also wrote the music to the world-famous hymn ‘Onward Christian Solidiers’. 

It seems he also tried his hand at a lyric to the tune, which was later discarded.  Now, though, the sole surviving copy of that lyric has emerged – yet another extraordinary treasure recently found amongst a cache of forgotten manuscripts.

We are delighted to reproduce the full lyric here.

Tune:  St Gertrude by A. Sullivan

Hymn for the Unsung Heros

Onward First Responders, marching as to war,
With the ACPO Guidelines going on before.
Tableaus at the ready, armed against the foe,
Forward into battle see those White Hats* go!
(*LE singers may substitute “Blue lights” here. – AS.)

Refrain

Onward First Responders, marching as to war,
With the ACPO Guidelines going on before.

Dawn of retribution! Watch the suspects stare;
They and their Redeemer know what you’ll find there!
All their nasty surfing, docs and pix and more;
See, they fear the advent of the long arm of the Law.

Refrain

Image every hard drive, every USB,
Make a very detailed chain of custody,
There will be no tiny evidential fault
Bag and tag and walk the lot then slap it in the vault.

Refrain

Run it up in EnCase, data carve ‘til dawn
Bookmark hot and gmails, all the dodgy porn,
Short and sweet the statement witnessing the crime
Which gets them off the premises or even doing time.

Refrain

Like Olympic medalists going at full steam
Onward First Responders!  Ply that data stream!
Vanquish all the villains, work with all your might
Show the unbelievers just how ev’ry bit can byte

Arthur Sullivan at his other keyboard

All together now…

Onward First Responders, marching as to war,
With the ACPO Guidelines going on before.

Digital forensics – an historical perspective

Digital forensics is frequently said to be a ‘new’ science.  In fact, rummaging around in other people’s bits and bytes looking for evidence of their nefarious actions is a time-honoured occupation. There are those who would scoff at this assertion.  But this week’s sensational discovery of a cache of previously unknown manuscripts from the hands of famous writers will give the doubters pause for thought.

These fragments of lost literature, found in the recess of an antique commode sent up to auction by an anonymous owner, have been hailed by experts as an important breakthrough and palpable proof that past generations knew at least as much about the theory and practice of digital forensics as we do today.

In the best, ground-breaking traditions, this blog makes its debut by bringing you exclusive excerpts from these extraordinary texts.