Document Preview:
Seminar 3: Computer Basics, Data Acquisition, and Tools Laureate Online Education Computer Forensics © All rights reserved 2005 - 2012. The Computer Forensics module, in all its parts: syllabus, guidelines, lectures, discussion questions, technical notes, images, projects and any additional material is copyrighted by Laureate Online Education B.V. Computer Forensics Seminar for Week 3: Computer Basics, Data Acquisition, and Tools In this seminar, we will learn about the basics of storage systems and the principles of storage data acquisition. Although there are different kinds of sophisticated software for digital investigators to recover some deleted files on an acquired hard drive, it is important to understand what is happening during this process. This seminar provides an overview of how computers and storage systems work, how to acquire digital evidence on hard drives, and how to analyze acquired hard drives. Furthermore, this seminar will give an overview of currently available forensic tools. NOTE: It should be noted that in this seminar, we will have an extensive list of software packages. If you will not pursue your career as a digital forensic investigator, you could skip these parts. However, if you plan to further your career in computer forensics, then the list is supplied so that you can use it as a catalog of useful software tools, as no single software tool solves all forensic analysis problems. BIOS BIOS (basic input output system) is the software (firmware) that is programmed into a ROM (read-only memory) chip built onto the motherboard of a computer. During the booting process, BIOS makes the computer system run an initial POST (power-on self-test) of the computer, initialize circuits, load the boot program from the boot disk, and then verify that all of the computer’s components are functioning properly, including the disk drives, monitor, RAM, and keyboard. After the POST process, the control is handed over...