Progress Report #1

This week is the start of my research for my project.  I had a meeting with my instructor today to discuss topics that I might want to do my research project on.  We discussed the ideas that I had mentioned in my introductory post: digital forensics, privacy, and social media.  I had originally thought about doing research paper on digital forensics, but it felt too similar to what one of my peers was working on which was digital forensics of mobile devices.  I did not want to do a topic that was too similar to his.  This gave me the challenge of thinking of ways to still research digital forensics in a way that was distinctly different from his topic and to combine digital forensics and social media which led me to the my research question:  What are the challenges of Social Networking Forensics? 

In my research, I would like to investigate and analyze the challenges that present themselves in social networking forensics, and also explore ways in which we can navigate these challenges.  I have searched around some academic websites to find articles that may help me in my research, and am having a hard time finding articles within the database system, but I believe that this is an important topic, and will continue to dig to find some research that has been done in this area.  One way I plan to accomplish this is to seek advice on the best databases and resources on this topic from our OC librarians.

Another method that I had in mind for my research was to interview someone that deals with digital forensics and social networking forensics.  One way I am hoping to achieve this is to put it out there on my local community Facebook page to see if there is anyone that can connect me with someone locally in the industry whom I can pick there brains.  If that approach doesn't work, I will work in the old fashion way to find someone I can interview by picking up the phone and calling around to various law enforcement agencies.

So far, I feel like I am on track with where I need to be, and will be working on the goals mentioned above, this next week.  I may find that I need to tweak my research question some if I cannot find substantial resources on this proposed question, but I am confident that I want to research social networking forensics.