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Deloitte
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Deloitte is delighted to announce the launch of its IT Forensic team, part of its growing Enterprise Risk Services division.  This service will help Irish companies to combat corporate crime.

IT forensics is the science of recovering and analysing deleted, cached and hidden data from IT equipment such as PCs, PDAs, servers and mobile phones. Computers are now used in the majority of frauds and other offences affecting Irish business, not only to commit crimes, but to plan them and to cover the criminal’s tracks afterwards.

High profile international cases such as Enron and Parmalat have shown the power of IT forensics to uncover the truth. In recent times, IT forensics has even paid a key role in solving murder cases, such as the Whelan murder in Ireland, and the Entwhistle murders in the US.

According to Deloitte, IT forensics is perhaps the most useful forensic technology for solving crimes in corporate environments. Better still, it is now readily available to companies, at the highest standards and at reasonable rates.

Deloitte’s IT Forensic team, which has completed hundreds of successful IT forensic investigations and has access to leading-edge forensic technology tools, can assist organisations with evidential data recovery and analysis, post-incident lock down of IT systems, detection of inappropriate computer use, and IT security.

According to Gerry Fitzpatrick, Partner, Deloitte, the vast majority of corporate crimes carried out today against Irish organisations involve the use of computers. “Crimes such as financial fraud and theft of commercial data require the offenders to make use of IT systems, be it for simple operations or as part of highly complex transactions. Even when an organisation’s IT assets are not used to commit the offence, in many cases evidence can still be found on its computer systems,” says Fitzpatrick.

Taking proactive steps to tackle and prevent computer crime will protect companies from potentially major financial damages and harm to their reputations, he adds. “The information that IT forensics provides can help businesses minimise damage to their reputation and revenues, and recover losses. Where necessary, it can greatly increase the chance of successful prosecutions, and, at the very least, will lessen a company’s legal exposure,” comments Fitzpatrick.

“We see it as an increasingly integral part of all internal and external HR and financial fraud investigations by organisations, and we believe that the Deloitte team will continue to grow to meet these increasing client needs,” says Fitzpatrick.

Among the services provided by the Deloitte IT Forensic Unit are:

Incident response – Rapid reaction to help clients prioritise the steps required following a computer crime.

Evidential data recovery – Deloitte’s specialists have experience in identifying, recovering and delivering evidential data to bodies such as Garda Siochana, the UK Serious Fraud Office, and the FBI.

Evidential data analysis – The Deloitte IT Forensic Unit can analyse the vast amounts of historical data involved in complex transactions and deliver summarised reports.

Post-incident lock-down – When a computer crime has been uncovered, the first priority is to ensure that key systems cannot be compromised further.

Electronic Intelligence Management – The Unit can compile and store the large volume of information related to a computer crime in a database format that can be mined by the entire investigative team to reveal previously undetected links.

Detection of Inappropriate Computer Use – Deloitte uses specialised image detection software from Irish company PixAlert to search corporate networks for illegal and illicit images.

Data analysis – Data such as payroll and accounts payable can be analysed to eliminate anomalies within an organisation such as duplicate vendor payments, invalid VAT numbers, and payments to dormant vendor accounts.

Security advice – Deloitte’s specialists have extensive experience of performing internal and external technical security assessments in the most complex corporate IT environments.

The Deloitte IT Forensic Unit is headed by Andrew Harbison, who has successfully concluded over 150 IT investigations during the past four years. Harbison is a veteran “white-hat” hacker and has conducted and managed a large number of vulnerability assessments and penetration tests of the IT systems of major Irish and international companies. The Deloitte IT Forensic Unit is part of the global Deloitte IT Forensic team and, as such, can also draw on its vast experience.