tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-89047680983075583422026-03-30T02:33:48.025-07:00This blog is no longer active and is maintained for archival purposes. It served as a resource and platform for sharing insights into forensic multimedia and digital forensics. Whilst the content remains accessible for historical reference, please note that methods, tools, and perspectives may have evolved since publication. For my current thoughts, writings, and projects, visit AutSide.Substack.com. Thank you for visiting and exploring this archive.Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.comBlogger1899125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-5500643709961926012025-07-12T11:08:00.000-07:002025-07-12T11:08:46.014-07:00

It’s been a while since I posted here. I’ve moved on from daily forensic casework and stepped back from the blog to focus on broader systems work—on justice, equity, neurodiversity, and how we reckon with broken epistemologies. But sometimes something happens that drags you out of retirement whether you like it or not. And this is one of those moments. The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF)

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-39006636186155806822025-01-03T16:43:00.000-08:002025-01-03T16:43:24.205-08:00

 January 2025 UpdateI received a very odd notice from Google congratulating me on the traffic that this blog has received in 2024. Yes. 2024. I haven't really thought about this space in more than 4 years. But there it was. So I clicked into the stats. It turns out this blog logged over 115 thousand visits last year. WTF? Since I started this space, it's logged over 1.88 million views.

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-59597439290014932382020-09-22T07:40:00.003-07:002020-09-22T07:40:47.409-07:00

 This will be the final post in this space. I've retired from the practice. I'll leave this free resource up as an artifact and a reference. So long, and thanks for all the fish.

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-6643029793024598142020-03-27T07:50:00.000-07:002020-03-27T07:50:00.695-07:00

First of all, I hope this post finds you and yours in good health. I hope that you have enough to eat and have enough resources to meet your basic needs. I know that many folks have been sent home to work, some have even lost their jobs (some temporarily, some permanently). With courts closing and pushing trial calendars out, most of the legal support world is on hold. It's rough out there. I get

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-19022475614869348212020-03-25T10:09:00.000-07:002020-03-25T10:09:29.320-07:00

As firms and agencies urge their employees to work from home during the global pandemic, their employees’ confidential phone calls run the risk of being heard by Amazon.com Inc. and Google. Mishcon de Reya LLP, the U.K. law firm that famously advised Princess Diana on her divorce and also does corporate law, issued advice to staff to mute or shut off listening devices like Amazon’s Alexa or

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-60243418898869653442020-03-11T07:48:00.003-07:002020-03-11T07:48:48.462-07:00

When creating case reports, I like to use the terms from our discipline as defined in the various standards documents. Here are some of the most popular terms, and their definitions. Saving these here for quick reference. DEFINITIONS The following definitions for terms used herein are taken from the SWGDE Digital & Multimedia Evidence Glossary, Version 3.0 (June 23, 2016): Compression -

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-57824827671718114502020-03-10T09:00:00.000-07:002020-03-10T09:01:01.101-07:00

In criminal and civil trials around the world, both sides will often retain experts in various forensic science fields to analyze evidence and present their findings to the jury. In a fair process, and employing science, it's hoped that two similarly trained and equipped will arrive at the same place in terms of conclusions. But, this is often not the case. When experts disagree, judges (acting

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-50514699797251222292020-03-09T15:47:00.002-07:002020-03-09T15:47:44.070-07:00

I received word today that the IWCE 2020 conference in Las Vegas has been postponed. I was scheduled to speak at the conference, so I suddenly a few more free days on my calendar. Having recently travelled cross country, twice, I can tell you that no one is quite sure what to do or how to act. I think US companies and agencies are acting with an abundance of caution thus far. Meanwhile,

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-22912548625913732382020-03-03T12:40:00.000-08:002020-03-03T12:44:39.821-08:00

Amped SRL recently announced an update to Authenticate which includes an integration with SunCalc.org. It's a pretty cool free on-line tool to check for sun positioning relative to time and place. Kudos to Amped for adding the integration and speeding up the workflow for this task. The discussion of this new integration on Amped's blog notes that this integration can be used to check theories of

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-56109276886201924092020-02-29T07:00:00.000-08:002020-02-29T17:09:09.315-08:00

Radley Balko is at it again. This time, the focus of his attention is a ruling is tool-mark analysis. "This brings me to the September D.C. opinion of United States v. Marquette Tibbs, written by Associate Judge Todd E. Edelman. In this case, the prosecution wanted to put on a witness who would testify that the markings on a shell casing matched those of a gun discarded by a man who had been

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-61325606606884442542020-02-25T11:04:00.001-08:002020-02-25T11:06:04.089-08:00

Last year, I spent a lot of time talking about statistics and the need for analysts to understand this important science. Ive written a lot about the need for appropriate samples, especially around the idea of supporting a determination of "match" or "identification." Many in the discipline have responded essentially saying, it is what it is - we don't really need to know about these topics or

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-42488342174189703222020-01-30T08:37:00.002-08:002020-01-30T08:37:36.130-08:00

FISWG's Facial Comparison Overview describes Morphological Analysis as "a method of facial comparison in which the features of the face are described, classified, and compared.  Conclusions are based on subjective observations." ASTM's E3149 − 18, Standard Guide for Facial Image Comparison Feature List for Morphological Analysis, provides practitioners a 19-table guide of features

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-22948981204564550442020-01-23T06:58:00.002-08:002020-01-23T06:58:23.576-08:00

Back in early 2017, I wrote an article for Axon in support of their now-dissolved partnership with my former employer about Super Resolution. It seems that Super Resolution is back in the news. By way of updating that post, let's revisit just what's going on with the technology and the few problems it may cause if you don't understand what's happening. Vendor reps note that Super Resolution

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-64599012218322626752020-01-07T10:11:00.004-08:002020-01-07T10:52:17.683-08:00

Whilst we were all minding our own business, it seems that the US Federal Trade Commission was busy investigating Axon for anti-competitive behavior. Last Friday, Axon CEO, Rick Smith, penned a piece on LinkedIn to make his case to the public. According to Smith, the FTC believes that Axon's acquisition of VieVu in 2018 was anti-competitive. I'm not a fly on the wall. I only know what I've read

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-66813644773941227432019-12-30T15:02:00.003-08:002019-12-30T15:02:42.502-08:00

The recent update to Amped SRL's flagship tool, FIVE, brought some UX headaches for many US-based users. You see, the redesigned reporting function does a something new and unexpected. Let's take a look, and offer a couple of work-arounds. Let's say you're used to your Evidence.com work flow, the one where all your evidence goes into a single folder for upload, and you're processing files for a

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-52150208027385469962019-12-22T12:00:00.000-08:002019-12-22T16:14:45.174-08:00

In my private practice, I often review the case work of others. This "technical review" or validation is provided for those labs that either require an outside set of eyes by policy / statute, or for those small labs and sole-proprietors who will occasionally require these services. Recently, I was reviewing a case package related to a photographic comparison of "known" and "unknown" facial

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-43128929675258935742019-12-16T09:05:00.000-08:002019-12-17T09:34:48.618-08:00

Independence matters. When learning new materials, it's important to get an unvarnished view of the information. Too many "official" vendor-sponsored training sessions aren't at all training to competency - they're information sessions, at best, or marketing sessions, at worse. Vendors generally don't want their employees and contractors to point out the problems with their tools. But as a

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-79338459752981374092019-12-13T09:33:00.001-08:002019-12-13T11:24:00.570-08:00

It seems that the Techno Security conference's addition of a San Diego date was enough of a success that they've announced a conference for 2020. This is good news. I've been to the original Myrtle Beach conference several times. All of the big players in the business set up booths to showcase their latest. For practitioners, it's a good place to network and see what's new in terms of tech and

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-19882909700344951942019-12-12T05:56:00.001-08:002019-12-17T09:35:01.704-08:00

Seats Available!  Did your agency purchase Amped FIVE / Axon Five, but skipped on the training? Learn the whole workflow - from unplayable file, to clarified and restored video that plays back in court. Course Date: Jan 20-24, 2020, Course location: Henderson, NV, USA. Click here to sign up for Introduction to Forensic Multimedia Analysis with Amped FIVE. keywords: audio forensics,

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-11375794340787327232019-12-10T09:35:00.002-08:002019-12-10T09:36:14.168-08:00

I've sat through a few sessions on the Federal Rules of Evidence. Rarely does the presenter dive deep into the Rules, providing only an overview of the relevant rules for digital / multimedia forensic analysis. A typical slide will look like the one below: Those who have been admitted to trial as an Expert Witness should be familiar with (a) - (d). But, what about the Advisory Committee's

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-18983701697460880502019-12-09T08:32:00.000-08:002019-12-17T09:35:13.340-08:00

As a certified audio video forensic analyst, I need a platform with which to perform my work.  I've been rather clear in the past as to my choice of platform and the reasons for those decisions. But, an honest and ethical analyst must always check assumptions and assess the marketplace. Has the chosen toolset improved or declined vs the types of evidence items under exam today? Has the

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-83558684900822906432019-12-03T01:00:00.000-08:002019-12-17T09:35:25.028-08:00

Did your agency purchase Amped FIVE / Axon Five, but skipped the training? Still wondering which filters do what, and why it seems that things on the screen look worse the more you process your files? If you're called to testify, how will you answer the question about your proficiency in your tools? I'm here to help. Learn the whole workflow - from unplayable file, to clarified and restored

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-15496744880203099812019-11-26T09:28:00.000-08:002019-12-17T09:35:42.246-08:00

Get the most out of your training budget and save the planet whilst doing it. We live in interesting times. There's a couple of cultural themes that are dominating the planning sessions in government and private industry. Governments and private firms are concerned about sustainability and austerity. In order to satisfy sustainability initiatives, agencies are restricting travel. Given

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-32531313267503881262019-11-25T11:29:00.000-08:002019-12-17T09:35:54.699-08:00

Learn Amped FIVE anywhere, anytime! The most cost effective training on Amped FIVE available! The same great training, now offered on-line at a lower price. So many users of FIVE complained about the cost of travel to attend a training session. For others, they couldn't leave their state for training. Still others didn't have the time to dedicate a week off of work to go to training. I

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8904768098307558342.post-75223231564890147102019-11-21T17:54:00.000-08:002019-11-21T17:55:53.436-08:00

An interesting new article is available from David H. Kaye in Jurimetrics: The Journal of Law, Science and Technology Vol. 60, No. 2, Winter 2020. Abstract For decades, scientists, statisticians, psychologists, and lawyers have urged forensic scientists who compare handwriting, fingerprints, fibers, electronic recordings, shoeprints, toolmarks, soil, glass fragments, paint chips, and other

Jaime Hoerricks, PhDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07370775585003351900noreply@blogger.com0