How to get into Law enforcement forensics

I cannot talk for all law enforcement agencies, as some do recruit civilians to perform certain functions, but in general digital forensic practitioners in law enforcement are generally sworn members, meaning that the path into DF in law enforcement is usually through the ranks so to speak. I personally feel that this approach is a little outdated and no longer relevant in all aspects of law enforcement, but it is about changing an embedded institutional state of mind. Just to give you an idea, I have been in law enforcement 20 years, with 19 as a detective, and the last 12 in digital forensics, but if I left my country to go to the UK for example, I would be expected to go through the ranks from patrol constable and so on, despite my experience.

However, due to the demend for digital forensics in law enforcement, many law enforcement agencies around the world contract to private digital forensic labs to do their digital forensic work. Perhaps this is an option to consider if you can find a lab that does contract work for law enforcement. You may not be working "in" law enforcement, but at least working "for" law enforcement is the next best thing.

Hope this helps.

Well, you can't lie about your current wage so the only thing you could do is assure them that you really want the job for x, y and z reasons. No point worrying whether they think its suspicious or not, it's not something you can change.

Hi Harmony,

I think there are still plenty of civilian staff in CF roles within different Police forces throughout the UK, however you may have to be willing to move to another area and be flexible to get one. I do know that West Mids for example have a number of civilian staff in their HTCU.

When I worked for the Police (in Australia) there was that attitude about not training civilian staff because they will just up and leave at some point, but to be honest, what good is EnCase training to a Police Officer when he moves into the Homicide Sqaud? So yeh there is a little bit of that outdated attitude but I think you'll find certain forces are moving with the times.

I wouldn't worry too much about Network Forensics as most of the Police work you'll find will involve home computers, the odd business machine but don't generally deal with large intrusion detection cases. Similarly Linux is not an operating system you will come across often as one you need to examine and analyse but you may use it on your forensic workstation or as a boot disc, so it is good to be familiar with some forensic tools that run on Linux.

I think the most important skill for a CF examiner is good problem solving, so think about some issues you have come across in work and describe how you solved them, research, trial and error, what was the outcome, how did you solve the problem? This kind of stuff is great for interviews even if it is not strictly CF related.

I think you could also be pleasantly surprised to find that some Police Forces pay quite well, possibly even better than a junior role in a corporate outfit. )

I agree with what kiashi has said, although the current timing is not great I think opportunities will open up eventually. There is no pay standardisation across the country for civilian staff in the police, from what I have read. Some forces do indeed seem to offer quite attractive salaries.

As far as things to learn in the interim, personally I think having an intimate knowledge of the software (usage) you are likely to be investigating could come quite high up on the list.

I think Kiashi is pretty much right with the type of work that LE does. But you should keep in mind that many agencies (at least in Australia I am not sure about the UK) have both a forensic and computer crime unit. The digital forensic branch will get involved in any criminal investigation where digital evidence may be found, homicide, drug and sex offences etc. While the computer/hi-tech crime section (often part of the fraud squad) will deal with the offences where the computer is the tool of the crime. I find that often the hi-tech crime section will be sworn only, while the forensic section will employ civilians.

The attitude of not training civilian staff in Australia, was I think unique to the police force Kiashi worked for (and I am 99% certain I know which one it was). Most of the other police forces (that employed civilians) provided them with a high level of training and provided pretty reasonable pay. The other thing to keep in mind is that police forces are not the only law enforcement agencies to have DF branches. In most countries any large regulatory agency (eg customs, tax, immigration, even the education department in Australia) is likely to have some DF capability. Looking for jobs with these agencies might provide a stepping stone to police work is that is what you really want. Often these agencies only advertise on government job boards, and have really poorly worded job ads as the person writing it does not even understand what they are looking for.
In terms of what area to focus on, when I was employing we were happy to get anyone with any level of experience, but we were more concerned about the applicants problem solving, attention to detail and ability to perform under pressure, which was assessed through a practical test. As long as you had a IT degree of some sort and employment in IT most applications would make it to the practical assessment.

Mike Wilkinson makes a good point about the Police force that I worked for and I think even the attitude there has changed in the time since I left. While working here in the UK for the last three years I have noticed a very good attitude towards training police civilian staff, I have seen them on every training course I have taken in this country.

The other government jobs are out there too, HMRC, NHS, Home Office etc. etc. Since leaving the Police I have worked in two government investigation roles, in Aus and in UK and they have their similarities to LE work, such as still being about to work on criminal cases, still going out on search warrants etc. but you often get to do it without the nasty stuff you get in LE. Mike is right though you may not see these jobs advertised by recruiters or the like so it pays to check the government job sites and do a little investigation yourself to see what agencies have a forensic function. You can always get your CV out there, even if a position is not currently available.

Oh and don't worry about the pay thing, I took a pay cut to get in to forensics originally but no-one questioned my motivations, you've got to do what you've got to do to get your foot in the door, if your current role is not forensic at all then they aren't going to be suspicious about you taking a pay cut because it's effectively a career change.

Harmony,

Our HTCU has just been fully civilianised, and we will be advertising in the near future. I agree the money is not great, but the experience has been worth while. I finished my MSc in Computer Forensics and managed to get 3 months voluntary work experience in the HTCU, after which they offered me a job, and i have now been working there for 2 years.

roles have become quite scarce recently due to budget cuts, but the civilianisation of our Scientific Support unit has freed up a role or two. Kiashi is correct when he said you may have to move to get a position, so keep this in mind.

Steve

thanks all for the comments it be a really good insight.

Kiashi is correct when he said you may have to move to get a position, so keep this in mind.

Kiashi is a "she" (which I know because she is a former colleague of mine at a certain Australian police agency).