Chat log file analysis – After Conversation
Duration
July 2005 – December 2007
Internal Participants
Kim Morfitt, Craig Valli
External Participants
WA Police Computer Crime Tim Thomas
This was an undergraduate project resulted in the production of a tool for forensic analysis of ICQ (on-line chat tool) log files. The tool allows reconstruction of conversations held by two parties by analysing the binary log files. Chat tools are used by criminals eg pedophiles or rapists to groom victims. These chat tools are also extensively used by criminal gangs and terrorists to organise. The ability to forensically analyse these log files is of critical importance in many investigations.
This project is now continuing on as a honours project with the student now expanding the repertoire of log files from chat systems that can be analysed.
Outcomes
Release of After Conversation 0.2 to law enforcement
Publications
Morfitt, K. and Valli, C. (2005). After Conversation – An Forensic ICQ Logfile Extraction Tool, In Proceedings of the 3rd Australian Computer, Network & Information Forensics Conference, School of Computer and, Information Science, Edith Cowan University, Perth, Western Australia, pp. 54-61.