Evaluation Proposal

This literature review can be used, but there’s information missing.

1. Discussion of the preservation of digital evidence (the topic) is appropriate. You also introduce the program relating to the topic that is the focus of your evaluation proposal (Innocence Project). What is the connection between the two?

How does the Innocence Project preserve digital evidence or, perhaps, how do they ensure evidence is preserved digitally? The program evaluation should assess if the program (Innocence Project) is achieving its intended outcomes. Is preservation of digital evidence an intended outcome of the program? This needs elaboration.  3. In terms of potential political and/or ethical issues, consider how your evaluation study could result in these issues. For example, what if you discover the program isn't achieving its intended outcomes? Might this create political and/or ethical implications?

There are a number of important aspects that are relevant when it comes to the aspect of digital preservation of evidence, to start with it is important to note that the aspect of wrongful conviction has been in existence over the years. It is clear that the preservation of evidence can help solve many cases, mostly those affecting innocent individuals who get sentenced for crimes that they did not commit. It is evident that wrong conviction in the USA has led to many people being faced with criminal charges that they were not responsible and, thus leading to the aspect of being convicted in the wrong way (Quick, & Choo, 2018).. Due to this factor there has been the need to come up with effective measures that would help ensure that cases of wrongful convictions are dealt with in the best way possible (Dilijonaite,et al.,2018).In current times there have been measures put in place in order to ensure that the instances of wrongful convictions are dealt with in the best way possible (Quick, & Choo,2014).

Current Aspect of Wrongful Convictions

Wrongful convictions have been on the rise and this is mainly because most of these technologies are not utilized in the best way possible needed to solve crimes. Additionally, the development of DNA exonerations has also led to wrongful convictions. This is an indicator that the criminal justice system has not been effective and efficient in service delivery. This fact shows that the criminal justice system should be evaluated in order to ensure that its goals and objectives are in line with the needed reforms and also is able to serve justice to people (Sunde,et al 2017).

It is clear that the modern day crimes have evolved and most of them are occurring through the use of computers. This aspect has led to the development of digital evidence needed to deal with such cases. It is evident that digital evidence is stored in binary from and in this aspect the binary aspect can be defined as a language that the computers are able to understand. This type of evidence is stored on hard drives and can be presented in court when needed. It is evident that the evolution of digital evidence has helped deal with electronic crimes that have been on the rise in recent times. Law enforcement agencies have been able to utilize this aspect and this has helped in the analysis of digital evidence needed to solve electronic crimes. In this instance it is clear that information management systems have to uphold the aspect of data preservation in order to ensure that such important data can be retrieved for future references. Digital preservation includes the aspect of safeguarding data with the aim of ensuring that such data is preserved and is not lost. Therefore the preservation of digital data allows people and the law enforcement agencies to access data and thus helping in the preservation of accurate records. However, in order to retrieve such data the law enforcement agencies should have the knowledge of data mining (Zhao, 2017).

According to Choo, & Dehghantanha, (2017), digital evidence can be used to solve most of the modern day crimes, this shows that the use of digital evidence is more convenient when compared to the use of other forms of evidence. Moreover, the use of digital evidence can help deal with the various problems associated by the use of DNA based evidence and also other forms of evidences that for a long period of time have had issues (Eoghan, Casey, 2017). 

Progress Made to Deal with Wrongful Convictions

In order to help deal with issues associated with wrongful convictions there are several projects that have been developed. An example of such a program is ‘The innocence project’; this project was established in 1992. This program works with law enforcement agencies, laboratories, defense lawyers and prosecutors with the aim of trying to litigate trials. This projects main aim is to ensure that justice is served in the best way possible and that the aspect of wrongful convictions is dealt with in the best approach possible (Kerr, 2005). Moreover, for such programs and projects to work well there is the need to ensure that the different law enforcement agencies and also other concerned bodies work in a common ground. Therefore, such projects need to work in a well synchronized and coordinated manner. Therefore, the effectiveness of such projects requires a legal framework that is similar. Lack of a clear framework has affected the functionality of such programs and, thus compromising the development of such projects (Casey, 2011). 

It is evident that wrongful convictions have had a negative impact on the justice system. However, the aspect of digital evidence helps to deal with the problems associated with wrongful convictions. Additionally, the development of forensic mechanisms has helped deal with the problems associated with wrongful convictions. Therefore digital evidence has helped deal with issues of wrongful convictions. For digital data to be considered as accurate evidence there is need to ensure a high level of integrity, especially during preservation. Additionally, the development of a legal framework will ensure that digital evidence works in harmony with the other forms of evidence in order to ensure that the aspect of innocence is preserved and that people are not convicted wrongly (Turner, 2005).

Political and Ethical Issues Associated With Digital Preservation of Evidence

There are a number of political and ethical issues that affect the aspect of digital preservation of evidence. The federal and state governments are responsible for developing laws, this means that the formulation of laws touching on digital preservation of evidence must be formulated by the legislative arm of the government before they are implemented. Secondly, this type of evidence may be faced by a number of ethical dilemmas that may interfere with the decision making process and thus interfering with the application of digital preservation of evidence. The fact that different states have different laws means that laws concerning digital evidence preservation may lack a synchronized and a well-coordinated approach and thus interfering with how these laws operate across the country. Therefore, the various stakeholders involved with the formulation of the various aspects touching on digital preservation of evidence should formulate policies that have a uniform approach on this particular matter.

References

Casey, E. (2002). Error, uncertainty, and loss in digital evidence. International Journal of Digital Evidence, 

Casey, E. (2011). Digital evidence and computer crime: Forensic science, computers, and the internet. Academic press.

Casey, E., Blitz, A., & Steuart, C. (2004). Digital evidence and computer crime. Academic press,

Choo, K. K., & Dehghantanha, A. (2017). Contemporary Digital Forensics Investigations of Cloud and Mobile Applications. In Contemporary Digital Forensic Investigations of Cloud and Mobile Applications (pp. 1-6).

Dilijonaite, A., Flaglien, A., Sunde, I. M., Hamm, J., Sandvik, J. P., Bjelland, P., ... & Axelsson, S. (2017). Digital Forensic Readiness. Digital Forensics, 117-145.

Eoghan. Casey. (2017). Digital Evidence and Computer Crime, Elsevier Academic Press

Grimm, P. W., Capra, D. J., & Joseph, G. P. (2017). Authenticating Digital Evidence. Baylor L. Rev., 69, 1.

Jones, A., & Alanazi, F. (2017). A Method to Enhance the Accuracy of Digital Forensic in the Absence of Sufficient Evidence in Saudi Arabia. International Journal of Social, Behavioral, Educational, Economic, Business and Industrial Engineering.

Kerr, O. S. (2005). Digital evidence and the new criminal procedure. Colum. L. Rev., 105, 279.

Liu, Z. J. (2017). A cyber crime investigation model based on case characteristics. International Journal of Digital Crime and Forensics (IJDCF), 9(4), 40-47.

Lupariello, F., Curti, S., Duval, J. B., Abbattista, G., & Di Vella, G. (2018). Staged crime scene determination by handling physical and digital evidence: Reports and review of the literature. Forensic SCIENCE INTERNATIONAL; , 288, 236-241.

Quick, D., & Choo, K. K. R. (2014). Data reduction and data mining framework for digital forensic evidence: storage, intelligence, review and archive.

Quick, D., & Choo, K. K. R. (2018). Digital forensic intelligence: Data subsets and Open Source Intelligence (DFINT+ OSINT): A timely and cohesive mix. Future Generation Computer Systems, 78, 558-567.

Sunde, I. M., Flaglien, A., Dilijonaite, A., Hamm, J., Sandvik, J. P., Bjelland, P., ... & Axelsson, S. (2017). Cybercrime Law. Digital Forensics, 51-116.

Turner, P. (2005). Unification of digital evidence from disparate sources (digital evidence bags). Digital Investigation, 2(3), 223-228.

Zhao, B. (2017). 10. Study and Realization of Digital Forensics Key Technology Based on Cloud Computing. Revista de la Facultad de Ingeniería, 32(14).