|
Nicholls Data Recovery, llc |
||||||||||
|
||||||||||
|
978-621-5477
jnicholls@nichollsdatarecovery.com |
|
|||||||||
|
Cell Tower Location Forensics |
||||||||||
|
Cell Site Location Information analysis and mapping is the science
of understanding the content of cell phone service provider information and
being able to draw proper conclusions about the cell phone from those records.
Proper conclusions includes both what can be determined about what was going on with the
cell phone as well as what cannot be determined about what was going on with the cell phone.
With the introduction of smart phones, cell phone location information is also also maintained by many smart phone application vendors that are not kept on the cell phone. Thus smart phone application vendor records can be just as important as cell phone company records. Again, proper conclusions from smart phone application vendor records includes both what can be determined as well as what cannot be determined. Cell Site Location Information analysis and mapping is technically valid science. However, many times the presentation of an analysis in a court room to a Judge or Jury is made invalid by the way it is presented and by the conclusions or opinions reached that is not supported by the scientific data. Many times attorneys, both prosecution and defense look at cell phone service provider records as a simple spreadsheet with one spreadsheet line per phone call. Most cell phone vendor call detail records (CDR) will have a number of calls where a single call will be displayed in two or three or more lines in the spreadsheet. Some vendors will show the time in one time zone for one type of call and a different time zone in another type of call. There are other scenarios in cell phone service provider records where the specifics of the call should not be glossed over nor group into a general rule of thumb of what "normally" happens. When it comes to the court room, a case may rely on one or a handfull of calls. Although there are many rules of thumb for how a cell phone may interact with a cell tower or cell phone network, it is important for a Judge or Jury to understand if each of those specific case important calls does or does not fall into that rule of thumb. With many rules of thumb, there is not enough information available in the cell phone service provider records to definitively determine if the rule of thumb applies or not to the specific phone call. As with computer forensics, the first consultation on forensic cases or forensic tasks is always free of charge. |
||||||||||
|
|
||||||||||
|
Nicholls Data Recovery, LLC P. O. Box 30, Gloucester, MA 01931 Joseph A. Nicholls, Principal jnicholls@nichollsdatarecovery.com |
||||||||||