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AS COMPUTER users get more and more adept at disguising their identity, deleting and over-writing their data and destroying the hardware, so the job of the forensic computer examiner gets ever more challenging.

The most important ground rule is to preserve the evidence as soon as possible. If computers continue to be used, deleted data is over-written and important secondary sources such as printer spoolers, cache and internet histories become corrupted with fresh data.

FRAUDSTERS ARE becoming cleverer at burying their activities electronically, according to legal and accountancy professionals at financial and professional organisation pro•manchester.

A litigation seminar held by pro•manchester revealed that technology is fundamental to executing search orders and needs careful consideration. Judges are extremely wary of fishing expeditions, which means search orders have to be explicit, targeted and well thought-through to identify the material in question without trawling through irrelevant or privileged information.

RECENT CHANGES in the law have severely restricted tracers’ access to legitimate sources for tracking down debtors.

Tracing agents have been under pressure over the past few years, facing tighter controls over what they are allowed to do to find debtors. One of the biggest blows to the industry was the Data Protection Act 1998 or, as it is known by creditors and tracers alike, ‘the debtor’s charter’.

JUSTICE MINISTER David Hanson recently announced tougher, more intensive punishments for people who are convicted of carrying knives.

“This means a significant loss of liberty and free time for all those knife offenders across the whole of England and Wales,” he said.