Kerala - Thiruvananthapuram   

CDAC to set up mobile phone forensic laboratory

G Anand

To check misuse of cellular phones for criminal purposes

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The National Resource Centre for Cyber Forensics at the Centre For Advanced Computing (CDAC) here is setting up a "mobile phone forensic laboratory" to help law enforcement agencies in the country investigate cases involving misuse of cellular phones for criminal purposes.

Though instances of crime and mischief using cellular technology have been on the increase in the country, the State police forces lack cyber forensic tools and laboratories to examine digital evidence in mobile phones that could form a key part of a criminal or civil prosecution.

Recently, a six-minute pornographic video clip featuring a famous Bollywood actress look-alike was sent as multi-media message to several cell phone users in Mumbai. The Maharasthra police are investigating the case.

In Kerala, where there are more than 23 lakh cell phone users, the police have been receiving complaints of cell phones being misused for sending abusive, threatening, alarming and pornographic messages. Instances of using Internet-based software tools to spoof short message service (SMS) communications and misuse of "Blue Tooth" technology (one which enables cell phones and lap top computers to transmit data over short distances) to spread viruses that damage cell phones have also come to the notice of the State police.

The State Crime Branch police are currently investigating several cases in which digital evidence in the cell phones of suspects could aid prosecution. However, the State Forensic Sciences Laboratory does not have the expertise to handle digital evidence in computers and cell phones.

V. K. Bhadran, joint director, National Resource Centre for Cyber Forensics, CDAC, said that taking discreet photographs, recording private conversations on the sly and unauthorised video recording was now within the grasp of cell phone users. A video image of an unsuspecting person could be captured using a mobile telephone camera, transferred to a computer and digitally altered by adding pornographic content. The altered image could be used for blackmailing the person or discrediting him by sending the content as multi-media messages to other cell phone users.

Mr. Bhadran said that the CDAC was developing specialised forensic tools that would enable recovering data, even deleted files and SMS messages, from cell phones. Data stored in a cell phone can be destroyed or made in admissible as evidence in court. Vital evidence may lie in deleted files or fragments of past files. The data in the cell phone and Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) will be forensically imaged in order to be examined. The CDAC will devise legally approved methodologies and software tools for evidence gathering so that it can be presented in a court ready statement. The agency will also provide expert witness services and help interpret the evidence for the prosecution and judicial officers.

The forensic analysis of cell phones would reveal the cell networks used, approximate location from which the cell phone was used at a particular time, last numbers dialled, short messages, names of groups, phone book numbers and other data in the phone memory.

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