2024-11-28

Computer Forensics Needed to Pin Down GMA

DATARECOVERYUNION.COM03 mins

Computer Forensics,GMA,PSAThe Aquino administration’s drive against corruption may need computer forensics to support the allegations against the Arroyo administration, a multinational risk consultancy said.

In a report dated Dec. 22, the Pacific Strategies and Assessments (PSA) said those involved in crimes like poll sabotage and plunder are secretive and are careful about avoiding a paper trail.

“Computer forensics might hold the key to finding the needed evidence,” said PSA managing director Scott Harrison.

“With the expanding use of computers and digital media in everyday transactions, evidence of criminal activities left in computers and other digital equipment clearly enhances court evidentiary procedures,” he added.

PSA though disclosed in the report that it is one of the companies practicing information technology (IT) forensics in the country. The company also has offices in Hong Kong, Shanghai, Beijing, Bangkok, Sydney and Milwaukee.

PSA said money laundering and convoluted business structures created to hide wrongdoing “increasingly require digital investigative techniques to prove a criminal case.”

“The majority of corruption cases in the Philippines are often hampered because much of the presented evidence is hearsay accusations of one or more people against others. Consequently languishing corruption cases are often dismissed or shelved due to a lack of concrete evidence,” Harrison said.

PSA said not one member of the Arroyos or their alleged co-conspirators in poll cheating and corruption have been convicted by the courts since President Aquino assumed office in 2010.

“The lack of investigative resources in the Philippines judicial system may prove to be a bigger impediment to President Aquino’s efforts to weed out corruption than the administration’s frustration with the Supreme Court,” the report read.

PSA said IT forensic specialists can create a mirror image of data inside a computer system and recover deleted, encrypted, or damaged files.

PSA claimed the recovery and analysis of hard disk drives, mobile phones and portable digital storage devices believed to be involved in crime are “critical digital evidence” that can boost one’s legal position in court.

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Data Recovery Glossary (Letter V)

DATARECOVERYUNION.COM01 mins

Virus Scanner
Software that is used to scan for and eradicate computer viruses, worms, and Trojan horses.

Viterbi Detection
An algorithm used in read channel technology that detects an entire sequence of data bits at a time and determines the most likely sequence of data bits by comparing actual sequence of data bit samples with sequences of possible data bit sample to accurately detect that data written to disk.

Voice Coil
An actuator motor; the force of the magnetic rotary voice coil produces a movement of the head that is proportionate to the force exerted by the coil.

Volume
A portion of a physical disk that functions as though it were a physically separate disk.

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RAID Data Recovery Is Possible!

DATARECOVERYUNION.COM14 mins

RAID Data RecoveryWhat if your hard drive decides to enter the Elysian Fields in this very moment? Sure, you could simply get a new hard drive to substitute for the defective one with a quick run to your favorite hardware store. And with last night’s backup you might even reconstruct your installation quickly. But what if you don’t have a backup? The truth to be more like this: many users don’t even have a backup, or it simply is too old and thus useless for recovering any useful files at all. In case of real hard drive damage, only a professional data recovery specialist can help you – say bye-bye to your vacation savings!

Hard drive failure is especially disastrous for smaller companies working with a single server and a single disk, if they do not have a complete and working data backup at hand. The whole situation is even more complicated if the broken hard drive is a member of a RAID array. Neither hard drive failure in RAID 1 nor RAID 5 will result in data loss, since this scenario has been taken care of by the choice of these RAID levels in advance. But the risk of human error increases: self-made data loss occurs if you accidentally substitute the wrong drive in a degraded RAID 5 array (one with a failed hard drive).

But not all hard drives that show failure symptoms are defective. Sometimes, so called “soft errors” can be fixed using data recovery software. But even in this case, you should weigh the risks to see if it makes sense to take care of the problem yourself or get help from professionals. You might not be able to detect a controller failure right away, for example; usually, users assume a problem with the hard drive. Here is our rule of thumb: if you hear clacking sounds in the potentially defective hard drive, or if the computer’s S.M.A.R.T. function indicates an error during the boot process, something is wrong for sure.

What can you do once you know that an important hard drive is definitely broken? Or what happens if you pulled the wrong drive out of the slot while you were desperately trying to save your data? First of all: don’t panic! You need to act systematically and thoughtfully to be successful, as well as to ensure that you spend as little as possible on recovery – costs can hits four digits easily.

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