Viability of Consumer Grade Hardware for Learning Computer Forensics Principles

Abstract

We propose utilizing budget consumer hardware and software to teach computer forensics principles and for non-case work, research and developing new techniques. Consumer grade hardware and free/open source software is more easily accessible in most developing markets and can be used as a first purchase for education, technique development and even when developing new techniques. These techniques should allow for small forensics laboratories or classroom settings to have the tooling and framework for trying existing forensics techniques or creating new forensics techniques on consumer grade hardware. We’ll be testing how viable each individual piece of hardware is as well as combinations along with seeing at which point utilizing forensics-grade hardware becomes necessary in order to proceed.