What does it mean for Digital Forensics?
The added security features on Windows Vista mean that law enforcement officers need to be even more thorough when seizing PCs. Speaking at the E-Crime Congress in London on March 28th, Eric T Ashdown (Director, Microsoft Trustworthy Computing) spoke about the additional security features put in place by Microsoft to enable added protection for both companies and private individuals who store sensitive data on their computers.
Included in the ‘Enterprise' and ‘Ultimate' versions of the software, the BitLocker Drive Encryption aims to address the threat of data theft from lost or stolen machines. It operates by either a cryptographic hardware chip or a USB device being required to access the content of the machine. According to Microsoft "BitLocker prevents a thief who boots another OS or runs a software hacking tool from breaking Windows Vista file or performing offline viewing of the files stored on the protected drive".
This means that when a Police Officer or Digital Forensics expert arrives at the scene to seize a PC running Vista, they must be sure to search the premises fully for any external devices as they may be needed to access the PC.
Microsoft deal with around 5,000 attacks on their system every day and filter over 3.8bn spam emails across their MSN network and Hotmail on a daily basis. Security is one of their prime concerns and this new technology is a testimony to their commitment to helping fight e-crime.
Find out more about Microsoft Vista.