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Hard to believe that next week's 2011 LEVA Training Conference is already upon us. I'll be out in Coeur d'Alene all next week, and I'll be giving a presentation on the AVI file format and VirtualDub at the conference late Thursday afternoon. There are tons of great training sessions going all week long. Hope to see you there!

We recently purchased a new cellular phone for our eight-year-old son. The phone allows him to make or receive calls only from a defined list of telephone numbers, which we enter into it, and provides emergency 911 access. A few months ago, a friend of his from school came over and she had a new LG Migo "kid-friendly" cellular phone from Verizon Wireless. Once we saw the LG Migo, we knew we'd be getting him a cellular phone long before we had initially planned. While the Migo is a neat device, we ended up going with the Firefly, which uses Cingular's network.

The Firefly can be used as a pre-paid device, or you can subscribe to a monthly service plan. As with nearly all pre-paid services, the per minute rates are a little outrageous ($.25/min.), but since we anticipate minimal usage, we should be alright for the immediate future. The fact of the matter is this was an impulse purchase, and we may eventually change to the LG Migo and Verizon Wireless anyway.

You know what they say – the old has gone, and the new has come. Mozilla has just announced that they will be retiring their Firefox 4 browser – strange, isn’t it, considering Firefox 4 shipped a mere three months ago. Well, at least Firefox 5 is now the de facto browser from Mozilla. Tuesday’s Firefox 5 release also saw Mozilla spell out the list of vulnerabilities it patched in that edition alongside 2010′s Firefox 3.6, although there was no mention of any bugs fixed in Firefox 4.

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This article appears in the February/March issue of Streaming Media Magazine.

There are three categories of software encoding tools: bundled, desktop, and enterprise. In this article, I'll walk you through the general buying considerations within each category and detail when you need to consider stepping up to the next category.

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Just finished reading the CNET article "Cops to Congress: We need logs of Americans' text messages". As someone who has analyzed mobile devices and call records for law enforcement for many years, I'm not surprised at all that law enforcement wants service providers to store more data. As a citizen of the United States, I'm a bit surprised the public seems to be sleeping on this one.

Make no mistake people, the issue under consideration here is whether or not you have the right to communicate via text message privately.

Evidence Technology Magazine has published their May-June, 2010 issue featuring a story on Forensic Video. The story was written by LEVA's Principal Forensic Video Instructor and features several LEVA members. The question you need to answer: Can video evidence be trusted?

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A number of readers have raised a very valid concern about Creative Cloud subscriptions: How can you retain access to your intellectual property (the work you’ve made with the apps) if you end your subscription?

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If you're responsible for recovering video evidence from DCCTV systems, be sure to check out our new class "DVR Assessment & Video Recovery". We'll be in WA, MD, TX and NY in the coming months. Hope to see you in class!

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The DoJ sent a letter to the attorneys for the Baltimore Police Department.

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It's after 4:00 am in the morning and I'm writing about codecs.  That isn't right.  Just curious what lossless video codecs others are using or have used and/or compared for forensic screen capture?  I'm sure the most common answer will be TechSmith's TSCC, but there are others out there that work quite nicely and are priced just right....FREE.

I posted a new member poll on the topic, which you'll find on the right-hand side of your profile page.  Also recently added the free LZO and GZIP based CamStudio codec to our files & downloads library and have been fiddling with some others.    Are you using something else, or do you prefer to keep all captures uncompressed?

If you haven’t already downloaded the latest mandatory AVG 2011 Free software update, it may be best not to if you want your computer to turn on again. The December 1 update is causing 64-bit PCs running Windows 7 to totally breakdown.

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General Dynamics is looking for an experienced audio examiner in the Baltimore area. The ideal candidate would have a bachelor's degree, several years of experience, and be able to obtain a security clearance.

Specific Responsibilities: Performs forensic analysis of digital information using standard computer forensics and evidence handling techniques, handles evidence, and conducts peer reviews of cases completed by other examiners and mentors less experienced examiners. Uses forensically sound procedures to identify network computer intrusion evidence and identifies perpetrators. Employs forensic tools and techniques to crack file and system passwords, detects steganography and recovers deleted, fragmented and corrupted data from digital media of all types. Observes proper evidence custody and control procedures, documents procedures and findings in a manner suitable for courtroom presentation and prepares comprehensive written notes and reports. Qualified examiners are required to maintain current knowledge of industry standards and practices as well as testify in Federal/Military court as expert witnesses.

Click here to view the official posting and further information.