The widespread availability and use of digital devices both enables criminal acts and helps to detect them.
The production and circulation of indecent images of children has been one area of crime that has
transformed in recent years because of developments in modern communication technologies. Through in depth ethnographic observations ...
The widespread availability and use of digital devices both enables criminal acts and helps to detect them.
The production and circulation of indecent images of children has been one area of crime that has
transformed in recent years because of developments in modern communication technologies. Through in depth ethnographic observations and qualitative interviews with four police forces in England, this article
examines the resources and labor required to turn digital footprints into evidence for the possession of
indecent images. In doing so, our aim is twofold. One, we detail the formal and informal processes whereby
large sets of data become discrete pieces of judicial evidence. A notable feature of these administrative and
technical processes is that while criminal justice agencies often strive for linear investigations, such
aspirations fail to acknowledge the messy interrelation of expertise and roles that underpin the
transformation of digital devices into evidence. As a second aim, we seek to identify similarities and
differences in the practices whereby evidence is constructed between digital and other areas of forensics. In
particular, this analysis raises questions around the descriptive and normative adequacies of prevalent
theories of objectivity for digital forensics.
