4 ms·

This is unrealiable and extremely risky to serve as case evidence. Becomes extremely easy for malicious actors (out or inside the police) to fake evidence and

This is unrealiable and extremely risky to serve as case evidence. Becomes extremely easy for malicious actors (out or inside the police) to fake evidence and frame anyone they'd like.

vintermann 4y ago
It's probably meant as a lead, not as evidence. Given that this is a kidnapping, likely murder case, there's probably tons of evidence if you're looking at the right guy. And I'm wondering about that, because we know the criminal must have been a pretty hard-core cryptocurrency nut. There aren't THAT many of them in Norway (they've already concluded they are a fluent Norwegian speaker).
- alophawen 4y ago
  > because we know the criminal must have been a pretty hard-core cryptocurrency nut Do we? I was still under the impression everybody was blaming her husband for the disappearance.
  - vintermann 4y ago
    I'm thinking of the actual kidnapper/killer. The husband has an alibi for the time of the disappearance. The suspicion against him was that he commissioned the disappearance of his wife, not that he did it himself.
- dagw 4y ago
  they've already concluded they are a fluent Norwegian speaker The person who wrote the ransom they believe to be fluent in Norwegian, there could easily be other people involved who're foreign.
- rmbyrro 4y ago
  My main concern is that this seems to be a precise lead. It might be unconsciously considered close to a real fingerprint. Instead of facing it just as a lead, it might influence investigators to, consciously or not, build confidence in framing a (wrong) person and and end up building a compelling case against them.
greggsy 4y ago
If there’s only one PC in a sea of Macs then it’s a good way to narrow it down. Even better if you can use the application characteristics to determine that someone was using a particular app at a particular time, then initiated a print. It’s not irrefutable evidence, but it’s someone that tells police that a specific event occurred, for which the suspect would be compelled to provide a reasonable response.
II2II 4y ago
Presumably it is to aid in finding the equipment used. Once they find the equipment and can positively identify it, they can use other evidence to establish to probable user of that equipment. As for malicious actors, wouldn't that be a risk for most forms of evidence? Likewise, wouldn't many of the techniques used to establish the validity of other forms of physical evidence be applicable when these techniques are used?
- rmbyrro 4y ago
  Fingerprints and DNA, for instance, are significantly less trivial to fake.
_jal 4y ago
That seems to be the norm with a lot of, um, creative criminal forensics. Bite mark identification was used forever until blown up by particularly shameless grifting, and has never been shown to work as practiced. [1] Tennessee still uses dowsing rods. [2] Fingerprinting as practiced is a bundle of folk practice, guesses, and some science. Quality varies wildly. [3] Fiber analysis, lie detectors, spatter analysis and many more techniques are all crap. When one bogus method is finally found legally unreliable, cops and prosecutors find a new one. [1] https://innocenceproject.olemiss.edu/radley-balko-reports-on-bite-mark-analysis-and-the-wrongly-convicted/ https://innocenceproject.olemiss.edu/radley-balko-reports-on... [2] https://www.themarshallproject.org/2022/03/17/witching-dowsing-buried-bodies-police https://www.themarshallproject.org/2022/03/17/witching-dowsi... [3] https://www.aaas.org/resources/latent-fingerprint-examination https://www.aaas.org/resources/latent-fingerprint-examinatio...

This is unrealiable and extremely risky to serve as case evidence. Becomes extremely easy for malicious actors (out or inside the police) to fake evidence and frame anyone they'd like.

vintermann 4y ago

It's probably meant as a lead, not as evidence. Given that this is a kidnapping, likely murder case, there's probably tons of evidence if you're looking at the right guy. And I'm wondering about that, because we know the criminal must have been a pretty hard-core cryptocurrency nut. There aren't THAT many of them in Norway (they've already concluded they are a fluent Norwegian speaker).

alophawen 4y ago
> because we know the criminal must have been a pretty hard-core cryptocurrency nut Do we? I was still under the impression everybody was blaming her husband for the disappearance.
- vintermann 4y ago
  I'm thinking of the actual kidnapper/killer. The husband has an alibi for the time of the disappearance. The suspicion against him was that he commissioned the disappearance of his wife, not that he did it himself.
dagw 4y ago
they've already concluded they are a fluent Norwegian speaker The person who wrote the ransom they believe to be fluent in Norwegian, there could easily be other people involved who're foreign.
rmbyrro 4y ago
My main concern is that this seems to be a precise lead. It might be unconsciously considered close to a real fingerprint. Instead of facing it just as a lead, it might influence investigators to, consciously or not, build confidence in framing a (wrong) person and and end up building a compelling case against them.

greggsy 4y ago

If there’s only one PC in a sea of Macs then it’s a good way to narrow it down. Even better if you can use the application characteristics to determine that someone was using a particular app at a particular time, then initiated a print. It’s not irrefutable evidence, but it’s someone that tells police that a specific event occurred, for which the suspect would be compelled to provide a reasonable response.

II2II 4y ago

Presumably it is to aid in finding the equipment used. Once they find the equipment and can positively identify it, they can use other evidence to establish to probable user of that equipment. As for malicious actors, wouldn't that be a risk for most forms of evidence? Likewise, wouldn't many of the techniques used to establish the validity of other forms of physical evidence be applicable when these techniques are used?

rmbyrro 4y ago
Fingerprints and DNA, for instance, are significantly less trivial to fake.

_jal 4y ago

That seems to be the norm with a lot of, um, creative criminal forensics. Bite mark identification was used forever until blown up by particularly shameless grifting, and has never been shown to work as practiced. [1] Tennessee still uses dowsing rods. [2] Fingerprinting as practiced is a bundle of folk practice, guesses, and some science. Quality varies wildly. [3] Fiber analysis, lie detectors, spatter analysis and many more techniques are all crap. When one bogus method is finally found legally unreliable, cops and prosecutors find a new one. [1] https://innocenceproject.olemiss.edu/radley-balko-reports-on-bite-mark-analysis-and-the-wrongly-convicted/ https://innocenceproject.olemiss.edu/radley-balko-reports-on... [2] https://www.themarshallproject.org/2022/03/17/witching-dowsing-buried-bodies-police https://www.themarshallproject.org/2022/03/17/witching-dowsi... [3] https://www.aaas.org/resources/latent-fingerprint-examination https://www.aaas.org/resources/latent-fingerprint-examinatio...