• Analytical Science and Technology
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• v.28 no.6
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• pp.398-408
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• 2015

Carbon monoxide (CO) intoxication, arising from CO from an ignited charcoal briquette (ICB), is a popular means of committing suicide in Korea. Most CO intoxications are related to suicide attempts; however, the possibility of a homicide disguised as a suicide cannot be ruled out. Therefore, forensic investigation of the deceased and the crime scene is crucial to confirm that the deceased committed suicide. Detection of the components of an ICB on the objects suspected of being contacted by the deceased, such as the hands, nostrils, and doorknobs, is essential for linking the crime scene to the victim in the case of suicides by ignited ICBs. The traces from an ICB were analyzed by investigating the morphological characteristics and obtaining elemental compositions. The ICBs were completely different from blackened wood, as detected by discriminant analysis with the elements of carbon and oxygen. We analyzed one case of CO intoxication to demonstrate an excellent procedure for verifying whether a suicide occurred with an ICB. We employed SEM-EDX for the analysis of an ICB, microscope-FT/IR and pyrolysis-GC/MS for a partly burnt resin-type substance, GC/MS for diphenhydramine (a sleeping drug), and GC/TCD for the CO-Hb level. We detected traces of an ICB on the hands, nostrils, and doorknobs, which were all discriminated into an ICB group. Detection of ICB traces from the nostrils could indicate that the deceased started the fire themselves to commit suicide. The partially burnt black material was analyzed as an acrylronitrilestyrene polymer, which is normally used to make bags for carrying or wrapping and could be assumed to have been used to transport the ICB. Diphenhydramine, a sleeping drug, was detected at a level of 2.3 mg/L in the blood, which was lower than that in fatal cases (8-31 mg/L; mean 16 mg/L). A CO-Hb level of 79% was found in the blood, which means that the cause of death was CO intoxication. The steps shown here could represent an ideal method for reaching a verdict of suicide by CO intoxication produced by burning an ICB in a sealed room or a car.

• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.32 no.4
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• pp.53-85
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• 2022

Small and medium-sized enterprises ("SMEs") are vulnerable to trade secret misappropriation. Korea's legislation for the protection of SMEs' trade secrets and provision of civil, criminal, and administrative remedies includes the SME Technology Protection Act, the Unfair Competition Prevention Act, the Industrial Technology Protection Act, the Mutually Beneficial Cooperation Act, and the Subcontracting Act. Among these acts, the revised SME Technology Protection Act of 2018 introduced the "administrative technology misappropriation investigation system" to facilitate a rapid resolution of SMEs' technology misappropriation disputes. On September 27, 2021, Korea's Ministry of SMEs announced that it had reached an agreement to resolve the dispute between Hyundai Heavy Industries and Samyeong Machinery through the administrative technology misappropriation investigation system. However, not until 3 years and a few months passed since the introduction of the system could it be used to resolve an SME's technology misappropriation dispute with a large corporation. So there arose a question on the usefulness of the system. Therefore, we conducted a comparative legal analysis of Korea's laws enacted to protect trade secrets of SMEs and to address technology misappropriation, focusing on their legislative purpose, protected subject matter, types of misappropriation, and legal remedies. Then we analyzed the administrative technology misappropriation investigation system and the cases where this system was applied. We developed a proposal to enhance the usefulness of the system. The expert interviews of 4 attorneys who are experienced in the management of the system to check the practical value of the proposal. Our analysis shows that the lack of compulsory investigation and criminal sanctions is the fundamental limitation of the system. We propose revising the SME Technology Protection Act to provide correction orders, criminal sanctions, and compulsory investigation. We also propose training professional workforces to conduct digital forensics, enabling terminated SMEs to utilize the system, and assuring independence and fairness of the mediation and arbitration of the technology misappropriation disputes.

• Journal of Convergence for Information Technology
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• v.10 no.5
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• pp.23-29
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• 2020

These days, digital forensic technologies are being used frequently at crime scenes. There are various electronic devices at the scene of the crime, and digital forensic results of these devices are used as important evidence. In particular, the user's action and the time when the action took place are critical. But there are many limitations for use in real forensics analyses because of the short cycle in which user actions are recorded. This paper proposed an efficient method for recovering deleted user behavior records and applying them to forensics investigations, then the proposed method is compared with previous methods. Although there are difference in recovery result depending on the storage, the results have been identified that the amount of user history data is increased from a minimum of 6% to a maximum of 539% when recovered user behavior was utilized to forensics investigation.

• Nano
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• v.13 no.11
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• pp.1850128.1-1850128.10
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• 2018

Glutathione (GSH), the protective agent and reducing agent, has been widely used to prepare gold nanoclusters (GSH-Au NCs) with stable fluorescence properties and negative charge of the surface. Meanwhile, polyethyleneimine (PEI) was used as the modification agent to synthesize magnetic ferroferric oxide nanoparticles ($Fe_3O_4$) with fantastic dispersibility and positive charge of the surface. Based on the electrostatic adsorption force, magnetic nano-$Fe_3O_4@GSH-Au$ NCs core-shell microspheres composed of magnetic $Fe_3O_4$ nanoparticles modified by PEI as the core and GSH-Au NCs as the shell were assembled. The prepared $Fe_3O_4@GSH-Au$ NCs microspheres harbored a uniform size (88.6 nm), high magnetization (29.2 emu/g) and excellent fluorescence. Due to the coordination bond action between Au atom and sulfhydryl (-SH), amino ($-NH_2$), carboxyl (-COOH) in sweat, $Fe_3O_4@GSH-Au$ NCs could combine with latent fingerprints. In addition, $Fe_3O_4@GSH-Au$ NCs with good fluorescence and magnetism could detect fingerprints on various objects. Significantly, the powders were not easy to suspend in the air, which avoided the damage to the health of forensic experts and the fingerprints by only powder contacting. Above all, $Fe_3O_4@GSH-Au$ NCs was successfully applied to the latent fingerprint visualization, which has great potential in forensic science.

• Journal of Information Processing Systems
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.346-376
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• 2018

Digital forensics is a vital part of almost every criminal investigation given the amount of information available and the opportunities offered by electronic data to investigate and evidence a crime. However, in criminal justice proceedings, these electronic pieces of evidence are often considered with the utmost suspicion and uncertainty, although, on occasions are justifiable. Presently, the use of scientifically unproven forensic techniques are highly criticized in legal proceedings. Nevertheless, the exceedingly distinct and dynamic characteristics of electronic data, in addition to the current legislation and privacy laws remain as challenging aspects for systematically attesting evidence in a court of law. This article presents a comprehensive study to examine the issues that are considered essential to discuss and resolve, for the proper acceptance of evidence based on scientific grounds. Moreover, the article explains the state of forensics in emerging sub-fields of digital technology such as, cloud computing, social media, and the Internet of Things (IoT), and reviewing the challenges which may complicate the process of systematic validation of electronic evidence. The study further explores various solutions previously proposed, by researchers and academics, regarding their appropriateness based on their experimental evaluation. Additionally, this article suggests open research areas, highlighting many of the issues and problems associated with the empirical evaluation of these solutions for immediate attention by researchers and practitioners. Notably, academics must react to these challenges with appropriate emphasis on methodical verification. Therefore, for this purpose, the issues in the experiential validation of practices currently available are reviewed in this study. The review also discusses the struggle involved in demonstrating the reliability and validity of these approaches with contemporary evaluation methods. Furthermore, the development of best practices, reliable tools and the formulation of formal testing methods for digital forensic techniques are highlighted which could be extremely useful and of immense value to improve the trustworthiness of electronic evidence in legal proceedings.

• Analytical Science and Technology
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.164-170
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• 2012

Cyanoacrylate fuming mehod is effective for latent fingerprints developing on non-porous surfaces. In this study, we investigated optimal conditions for latent fingerprint development using cyanoacrylate fuming method in vacuum chamber. The effects of temperature, relative humidity, fuming method and processing time were checked throughly. The amount of evaporated cyanoacrylate was increased at higher temperature, but cyanoacrylate polymerization on the fingerprint ridge was best at $30^{\circ}C$. With a relative humidity of 40% to 50% conditions, good quality of fingerprints were developed. If a relative humidity is lower than 30% or higher than 60%, polymerization rate of cyanoacrylate monomers on the fingerprint ridge was decreased. It was identified that application of $OMEGA-PRINT^{TM}$ dispersal pad or cotton ball with sodium hydroxide fuming method in vacuum chamber was more effective than natural fuming method. We found that cyanoacrylate processing time in vacuum chamber did not have more significant than relative humidity.

• Analytical Science and Technology
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• v.23 no.6
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• pp.544-550
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• 2010

Mistaking pink colored thermal oil for grape wine, a victim drank the oil to death which was analyzed to contain 39% of ethylene glycol. Thermal oil could be used for heat transfer to prevent the malfunction due to the high pressure in the boiler operated at high temperature when using water. Main component of thermal oil is known to be mineral oil or ethylene glycol. From the blood and other tissue of the victim from autopsy, ethylene glycol and its metabolite were simultaneously analyzed by GC/MS after extraction under acidic condition with acetonitrile followed by derivatization with BSTFA. About 0.2 g of the specimens were pretreated with 50 uL of 0.5 M HCl solution to keep acidic condition, then dehydrated with anhydrous sodium sulfate followed by concentration under nitrogen stream. Ethylene glycol and glycolic acid concentration in blood was measured to be $2,755\;{\mu}g/mL$ and $174\;{\mu}g/mL$ respectively. In other specimen, the concentration of ethylene glycol and glycolic acid was $860\;{\mu}g/g\sim1,290\;{\mu}g/g$ and $93\;{\mu}g/g\sim134\;{\mu}g/g$. Especially, crystal appeared in kidney which was supposed xalate from the metabolite of ethylene glycol.

• Journal of the Korea Institute of Information Security & Cryptology
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• v.33 no.4
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• pp.671-685
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• 2023

By applying artificial intelligence to image editing technology, it has become possible to generate high-quality images with minimal traces of manipulation. However, since these technologies can be misused for criminal activities such as dissemination of false information, destruction of evidence, and denial of facts, it is crucial to implement strong countermeasures. In this study, image file and mobile forensic artifacts analysis were conducted for detecting image manipulation. Image file analysis involves parsing the metadata of manipulated images and comparing them with a Reference DB to detect manipulation. The Reference DB is a database that collects manipulation-related traces left in image metadata, which serves as a criterion for detecting image manipulation. In the mobile forensic artifacts analysis, packages related to image editing tools were extracted and analyzed to aid the detection of image manipulation. The proposed methodology overcomes the limitations of existing graphic feature-based analysis and combines with image processing techniques, providing the advantage of reducing false positives. The research results demonstrate the significant role of such methodology in digital forensic investigation and analysis. Additionally, We provide the code for parsing image metadata and the Reference DB along with the dataset of manipulated images, aiming to contribute to related research.

• Informatization Policy
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.91-107
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• 2017

Digital forensics is the process of uncovering and interpreting electronic data and materials found in digital device in relation to crime. The goal of the process is to preserve any evidence in its most original form which shall be having the force of law. The digital forensic market is increasing with a growth of ICT in domestic and global market. Many countries including U.S. are actively performing researched regarding a structured investigation by collecting, identifying and validating the digital information for the purpose of reconstructing past events which so does in academic society in Korea. This paper is to understand overall research trend about digital forensics and derive future strategy by integrating the result of meta-analysis into practices based on five criteria - main theme and topic, analysis phase, technical method for analysis, author's affiliation, and unit of analysis and method. 239 papers are analyzed, which were selected out of 470 papers published for 10 years (2007~2016) in academic journal on the list of KCI (Korea Citation index). The results of this analysis will be used to examine the characteristics of research in the field of digital forensics. The result of this research will contribute to understanding of the research trend and characteristics leading the technology-driven academia, through which measures for further research development and facilitation are suggested.

• Journal of Advanced Navigation Technology
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• v.13 no.5
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• pp.639-645
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• 2009

It has increased rapidly use of GPS car navigation system in the last few years worldwide. The type of navigation operation is composed of hardware or software. Navigation based on software is stored in exterior storage(e.g. SD card) and executed. One of many navigation software, Mappy, is used most plentifully in Korea. It stores user information such frequently visited place, route and etc. in exterior storage. If it analyzes the dat of navigation, we gain the information such a suspect's movement, route of car. There are important means in a digital forensic perspective because it's available for investigating the crime such kidnapping, murder and etc. This paper provides the necessary information in digital investigation through the analysis of stored data of navigation in a digital forensic perspective.