Porn Detection Software & Ethics

[madmax0150]

Hey Ya’ll,
So at the repair company I work for, we recently had an incident where we found child pornography on a customer’s PC. I think we can all agree that all ethics (going through the personal files) go out the door when this sort of situation occurs. Obviously after finding the material that we did we turned it over to the authorities. This turned out to be an awesome opportunity for me to speak with an FBI computer forensics specialist, and pick their brain. But aside from that it got me thinking about how I could check the system for this sort of illicit content without actually having to look at people's personal files. I started researching online for some software that might do this for me. I came across several different programs but I couldn't find a “extended trial version” so I could try the software out before purchasing it.
Here's a list of a few software is that I found which could probably help me out. If anyone knows of a way for me to get my hands on a good trial version of these let me know. Also looking for any suggestions on any other software you might know of.
---Paraben's Porn Detection Stick
---SurfRecon Elite Edition

Now the ethics of the issue

I know what I did wasn't ethically okay (going through personal files), but at the time of the intake for the PC the customer acted suspicious and wanted to know a great deal about our confidentiality agreement. The confidentiality agreement goes out the freaking door when it comes to the sort of subject though. But the real question here is what if I was wrong in my assumption. This is why I'm looking for software which can check the PC for illicit content, so in case my assumption is wrong I will have not personally gone through the system and looked at all their personal files and information. Going through the system with their own eyes and looking at the information on it is obviously an ethical issue, but do you feel it is the same ethical issue if software does that for you?

Just wanted to know your guys's thoughts.

[hellow533]

Hey Ya’ll,
So at the repair company I work for, we recently had an incident where we found child pornography on a customer’s PC. I think we can all agree that all ethics (going through the personal files) go out the door when this sort of situation occurs. Obviously after finding the material that we did we turned it over to the authorities. This turned out to be an awesome opportunity for me to speak with an FBI computer forensics specialist, and pick their brain. But aside from that it got me thinking about how I could check the system for this sort of illicit content without actually having to look at people's personal files. I started researching online for some software that might do this for me. I came across several different programs but I couldn't find a “extended trial version” so I could try the software out before purchasing it.
Here's a list of a few software is that I found which could probably help me out. If anyone knows of a way for me to get my hands on a good trial version of these let me know. Also looking for any suggestions on any other software you might know of.
---Paraben's Porn Detection Stick
---SurfRecon Elite Edition

Now the ethics of the issue

I know what I did wasn't ethically okay (going through personal files), but at the time of the intake for the PC the customer acted suspicious and wanted to know a great deal about our confidentiality agreement. The confidentiality agreement goes out the freaking door when it comes to the sort of subject though. But the real question here is what if I was wrong in my assumption. This is why I'm looking for software which can check the PC for illicit content, so in case my assumption is wrong I will have not personally gone through the system and looked at all their personal files and information. Going through the system with their own eyes and looking at the information on it is obviously an ethical issue, but do you feel it is the same ethical issue if software does that for you?

Just wanted to know your guys's thoughts.

Here's a problem I see a lot, and a problem I have gone through. You did not just stumble upon the pornography when doing your job, but instead looked through his files on your own. He doesn't need to prove you looked through his files on your own, instead, you need to disprove it. That means you may have a lawsuit on your hands. You cannot have a program that looks for material that may threaten your client, because in 95% of cases you'd lose a lawsuit in court, and would probably be breaking your confidentiality agreement. You searched, on your own, for the material, and you cannot have a program that does the same. Because you threw him under the bus he'll try to drag you with him.

Now, if you stumbled upon this material you do have a duty to report it. However, the client has a reasonable expectation of privacy, and you did break your confidentiality agreement I'm sure, because you LOOKED for it. It's a lose lose honestly, you might be best off talking with your boss or attorney about this, because you broke company policy, and broke the reasonable expectation of privacy. That means you need to prove to a court you had a reason, or EVIDENCE of probable cause, to see these files. He only needs to prove that you didn't have a right to go in there, which is quite easy depending on the work.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fruit_of_t ... onous_tree

I'd suggest reading that as well, if you did actually obtain the information illegally, then you have a duty to admit it to the FBI. In any case, it depends on if they deem that his fourth amendment right was broken, and if he was denied his reasonable expectation of privacy.

[madmax0150]

woo ok... the storie is fake, im just looking for forensics software to play with. and get feed back on this sort of thing. thank you for the info.

[hellow533]

woo ok... the storie is fake, im just looking for forensics software to play with. and get feed back on this sort of thing. thank you for the info.

Don't make up fake stories for information like this. Instead, try asking for forensic software to play with. Now I remember working with forensics, but what I did was more hardware based. I would suggest looking in to retrieving information from wiped and damaged hard drives and memory (pretty much the backbone of computer forensics, which is data recovery).

Categoriser 4 Pictures and EPRB are the two forensic software I know about, but I'm sure you could do a quick Google search to find more. I honestly don't actually know what programs I worked with when I interned with a computer forensics "lab", but I might be able to find out tomorrow.

[anarchy420x]

Out of curiosity on a "Social" point of view, why would to use such a controversial ethical issue to try to get information on computer forensics tools?

[-Ninjex-]

woo ok... the storie is fake, im just looking for forensics software to play with. and get feed back on this sort of thing. thank you for the info.

Don't make up fake stories for information like this. Instead, try asking for forensic software to play with.

Keep in mind this forum is publically available. I'm sure he just did that for a good reason.

[madmax0150]

i was looking for insight into this type of issue, im taking a computer ethics class. and to build on that, what if you were doing a virus removal and found stuff in a temp file and if there no was legal agreement. in that case could you turn some over to the authorities? this is just hypothetical, so no one freak out ok.
hollow533, thank for the software names, know of any other for cell phone data recovery?

[hellow533]

Unfortunately I'm not able to give you any software that I might assume would be used for an illegal cause. I don't know if your story is fake or not, you could just be saying you're lying so I'll give you more information on software you could use against clients, since I was so unwilling to do so before. The software I provided is easy to find on the internet, maybe you could check there.

I'm not truly serious, but for your ethics class, how about this. You told me you are trying to use software against clients, because some client was suspicious about a confidentiality agreement.. I told you it's wrong and did not provide you with any software suggestions until after you said yourself that it was fake. You could be lying about it being a fake story and might actually be looking for software to use against a client. As far as I see it, I have as much probable cause (which is just about none) to not give you software suggestions as you had going through this "client's" information.

Make sense?

[madmax0150]

gotcha ya, makes sense. thank for the info it will work nicely into my final paper.