Investigating Child Exploitation and Pornography: The Internet, Law and Forensic Science

Investigating Child Exploitation and Pornography provides the historical, legal, technical, and social background for the laws prohibiting child exploitation, in particular, child pornography.

It offers a history of child exploitation cases and studies, outlining the roles of technology in this type of crime and the evidence they can contain, and documenting new research performed by the authors.

It details how successful undercover Internet operations are conducted, how the associated evidence is collected, and how to use the evidence to locate and apprehend the offender. The heart of this work is a legal section, detailing all of the legal issues that arise in Internet child exploitation cases. A forensic examination section presents evidentiary issues from a technical perspective and describes how to conduct a forensic examination of digital evidence gathered in the investigative and probative stages of a child exploitation case.

The book will become an indispensable resource for those involved in the investigation, prosecution, and study of computer-assisted child sexual exploitation.

The first comprehensive title in this subject areaUses real cases and examples of criminal behavior and the means to detect itProvides guidelines for developing a Field Manual and a Checklist to supplement the investigation and legal processEstablishes a reliable system and legal, procedural-backed protocol by which to conduct an online sexual investigation and collect evidence

Section 1 – The Influence of technology; Overview; Internet Applications; Cyber Victims; Cyber Offenders; Sources of Digital Evidence; Section 2 – Investigating Internet Child Exploitation; Undercover Operations; Collecting and Preserving Evidence on the Internet; Collecting and Preserving Evidence on the Internet; Tracking on the Internet; Search and Seizure in Cyberspace I: Drafting Warrants and Warrantless Searches; Search and Seizure in Cyberspace II: Executing the Search; Section 3 – Forensic Examination of Digital Evidence; Overview of the Examination Process; Servers and Networks; Section 4 – The Law of Internet Child Sexual Exploitation; Child Pornography; Pre-Trial; Trial; Final Thoughts