Monday, January 27, 2020

Criminal Investigation: Electronic Evidence Collection

Criminal Investigation: Electronic Evidence Collection According to the U.S. Department of Justice defines digital evidence as information and data stored on, received, or transmitted by an electronic device and determined to be of value to an investigation. Digital evidence can be latent, time-sensitive, easily changed, damaged, or destroyed, and can transverse jurisdictional borders (National Institute of Justice, 2008). As with any evidence, to be useful in proving or disproving criminal actions, the evidence and how it is obtained and analyzed must be reliable. Therefore, the processes used to obtain, handle, and analyze digital evidence should conform to accepted practices and utilize industry recognized and accepted tools. Additionally, persons responsible for identifying, collecting, transporting, storing, and analyzing digital evidence must be knowledgeable and properly trained in this field as well as having a good understanding of the legal requirements for search and seizure of electronic evidence. Digital evidence is found on a variety of electronic devices and many of these are utilized daily in almost all societies and enable people to interact with each other both near and far. This form of instant communications and e-mail provides a means for criminals to communicate with each other as well as with their victims (U.S. Department of Homeland Security U.S. Secret Service, 2007). When used in the planning and commission of a crime, the digital evidence stored on computers, network servers, storage devices and media, digital cameras, and other such digital devices can be valuable in solving crimes. Digital forensic investigators must also be cognizant that additional digital evidence may exist away from the scene, such on network servers used by email providers or social media sites or stored in online storage For digital evidence to be useful in solving crimes, it must be relevant and its reliability must be maintained throughout the process of search, seizure, examination, and analysis. First, and foremost, the search and seizure of any evidence must be conducted using a legal means, by either executing a search warrant or by one of the exceptions to a search warrant (National Institute of Justice, 2008). Once it is determined or suspected that digital evidence is involved in the commission of a crime, it is paramount that the scene is controlled and any digital devices and electronic storage media at the scene be secured to prevent potential damage, corruption, or destruction of any digital evidence. The scene should be fully documented to create an official record of the scene for later use by investigators and to aid in reconnecting any computers or devices seized. Care should be taken when documenting the scene to ensure running computers are not powered down or any evidence moved un til the entire scene is documented. Once the scene has been documented by either sketch, photograph or video, any devices to be seized should be either powered off or left with power on, according to departmental or agency procedures. This will best ensure any digital evidence contained on these devices is left intact and not damaged, corrupted, or destroyed by improperly powering off a device. Any electronic device seized should be properly labeled and packaged before transporting to preserve any digital evidence. If it is determined that computers in a powered-on state be powered down, then power must be removed by unplugging the power connector at the back of the computers power supply or by removing the battery on laptop computers. Packaging must include using the proper materials, such as cardboard boxes, paper bags, and anti-static bags to prevent the creation of static electricity or the buildup of humidity and moisture that could damage sensitive electronic components. Devices such as cell phones should be left in a powered-on state if found that way and should be transported in specialized packaging that prevents the reception of any signals (National Institute of Justice, 2008). A complete inventory of all items seized must be completed and each item must be entered on a chain of custody form. Personnel should also take care to preserve any traditional evidence th at may exist on these devices such as fingerprints or body fluids (National Institute of Justice, 2008). Once seized items have been properly packaged and transported, only persons trained and qualified in digital forensics procedures should conduct examinations and analysis of digital evidence. Anytime evidence is transferred to another person, the release and receipt of the evidence must be annotated on a chain of custody log. Additionally, forensic tools used to discover and recover any digital evidence should be court-approved or recognized by the forensic community and any examination or analysis of digital evidence must be performed on a copy of the original digital image. (National Institute of Justice, 2007). Electronic devices, especially those used to communicate with others, are in widespread use and often times, crimes are committed with these electronic devices. Digital evidence is not limited to cyber or computer crimes. Digital evidence can exist in a variety of instances where criminals, and sometimes victims, communicate using computers, social media, and cellular phones, as well as someone simply posting a criminal act on social media. The existence of digital evidence can be overwhelming in some cases, however, for evidence to be useful, it must be relevant, admissible, and reliable. To ensure digital evidence meets these requirements, agencies and department must ensure persons collecting, handling, transporting, and analyzing digital evidence follow department or agency procedures and that they are properly trained and utilize industry and court accepted procedures and tools. References National Institute of Justice. (2007, January). Digital Evidence in the Courtroom: A Guide for Law Enforcement and Prosecutors. Retrieved from National Criminal Justice Reference Service: https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/211314.pdf National Institute of Justice. (2008, April). Electronic Crime Scene Investigation: A Guide for First Responders, Second Edition. Retrieved February 13, 2017, from National Institute of Justice: https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/219941.pdf U.S. Department of Homeland Security U.S. Secret Service. (2007). Best Practices for Seizing Electronic Evidence v.3: A Pocket Guide for First Responders. Washington D.C., USA.

Sunday, January 19, 2020

Organizational Learning: Creating, Retaining and Transferring Knowledge Essay

Organizational Learning Introduction                   The modern corporate world is dynamic due to the ever changing business environment globally. To maintain the relevance and competence of firms in this conditions, organizational learning becomes handy and helpful for sustainability(Argote, 2011). Learning in organizations is the development of the labor force to upgrade their skills to match with the changes in business operations. It is a continuous process since change happens as times and seasons change. Therefore, organization learning is an important aspect for any business to thrive in the modern times.                   Organizational learning improves the competencies of individual employees. They acquire new skills and knowledge on tackling contemporary issues in business(Beitler, 2012). This makes the employees able to tackle business activities with boldness due to their enhanced professionalism.                   Learning is also important because it leads to dynamic leadership in the organization. The management is able to lead with inspiration for positive change in the company. This leads to improved management-employee relationships by enhancing learning and flow of important information across the organization.                   Continuous learning encourages team building in firms since the employees feel the importance of everyone’s contribution towards the achievement of the company’s goals. Employees are trained to perform other roles apart from their assigned ones. In the event of absence, another employ can stand for the absent one and hence teamwork(Argote, 2011).                   Learning and change have a great impact on employees of a given organization. Learning enhances working relationships between employees of different departments who mingle during the training sessions. Change helps individual to navigate the hierarchy of the organization(Beitler, 2012). When one employee is promoted due to advanced skills, another person gets promoted to take up his position and hence a positive impact on one another. References Argote, L. (2011). Organizational Learning: Creating, Retaining and Transferring Knowledge. New York: Springer Publishing Corporation . Beitler, M. (2012). The Fifth Discipline: The Art & Practice of The Learning Organization. Chicago: Doubleday Publishers Ltd. Source document

Saturday, January 11, 2020

Wassily Kandinsky

Wassily Kandinsky could have been the premier abstract artist of the 20th century is a world at war had no twice interfered with his artistic career and destroyed three of his early works. Kandinsky was born in Russia in 1866 and soon moved to Germany where he worked with the Bauhaus School of expressionist painters integrating art in architecture and design (â€Å"Artcyclopedia†).   He also founded the Der Blaue Reiter, a group of artists attempting to express and define spirituality through art (â€Å"Artcyclopedia†)   Kandinsky believed that music and art should be integrated as a well as a means of defining the influence of the soul on the outer world. To that end, he began his series called Composition and had completed 7 of them before the beginning of World War II. Tragically, the first three canvases in the series were destroyed during the war.   While Kandinsky could not have planned for the destruction of his work, the loss of the first three Composition pieces helps complete the series as an allegory for his life, the ultimate tribute to a man who believe art should be spiritual.At the only time in recent history when the entire collection, with full-size black and white photos of the lost three holding their place, was displayed, reviewer Mark harden called Kandinsky one of he most original and influential artists of the 20th century. â€Å"His â€Å"inner necessity† to express his emotional perceptions led to the development of an abstract style of painting that was based on the non-representational properties of color and form. Kandinsky's compositions were the culmination of his efforts to create a â€Å"pure painting† that would provide the same emotional power as a musical composition.The exhibition â€Å"Kandinsky: Compositions†, organized by Magdalena Dabrowski and on display at the Los Angeles County Art Museum until September 3, 1995, presents these monumental works together for the first and possib ly last time and provides an opportunity to witness the creative process of Kandinsky† (Harden, 1995). The loss of the first three works and the attempt at representing them in the show left the viewer with a great sense of loss, Harden wrote, but perhaps more interesting is the fact they were lost at sometime near the artist’s death in 1944. That they were destroyed in Germany during the war as some much of his life had been as well simply adds an ironic twist to the entire project.The other twist on the Composition   series is that the final painting is the only one of the series done on a black background. In 1911, when he was working on Composition IV and V, Kandinsky is quoted as saying, â€Å"(Black) is like the silence of the body after death, the close of life.†Ã‚   (Harden, 1995)   He painted Composition X on a black background just five years before his death, when Germany was once again disrupting the world and taking the world back to war.By 1911, Kandinsky was already a world-renowned painter and known for his desire to incorporate spirituality into his art but as tension rose in Europe, he returned to his native Moscow where he remained until 1921. Compositions VI and VII would be completed in 1913 and then he did not return to the series until a decade late.   (Geggenheim, 2007). â€Å"Composition VII is the pinnacle of Kandinsky's pre-World War One artistic achievement. The creation of this work involved over thirty preparatory drawings, watercolors and oil studies. Each of these is included in the exhibition, documenting the deliberate creative process used by Kandinsky in his compositions. Amazingly, once he had completed the preparatory work, Kandinsky executed the actual painting of Composition VII in less than four days.† (Harden, 1995).Composition VII may have also been intended to be his finale in the series as art scholars â€Å"through Kandinsky's writings and study of the less abstract preparatory wor ks, have determined that Composition VII combines the themes of The Resurrection, The Last Judgment, The Deluge and The Garden of Love in an operatic outburst of pure painting† (Harden, 1995). Because Kandinsky had such a strong belief in the use of abstraction to present underlying themes with symbols and it is likely that he had intended this wrapping up of religious themes to be his final work in the series (Long, 1975).   Then, he began his self-imposed exile to his native land and stayed there until it appeared Germany was a haven again for thought and progress.In 1922, he joined Bauhaus and in 1923, painted Compositions VIII, like all the works in the series it was highly representational of his emotions and mental state at the time of its painting. â€Å"Composition VIII reflects the influence of Suprematism and Constructivism absorbed by Kandinsky while in Russia prior to his return to Germany to teach at the Bauhaus. Here, Kandinsky has moved from color to form as the dominating compositional element. Contrasting forms now provide the dynamic balance of the work; the large circle in the upper left plays against the network of precise lines in the right portion of the canvas.† (Harden, 1975)   This work also is more bright and less chaotic than his final pre-war effort, possible indicative of a more upbeat and spiritual peaceful time. Kandinsky was making progress in his work, developing with the group at Bauhaus and gaining additional international acclaim. His first solo show in New York coincided with this work (Guggenheim, 2007).Perhaps this perceived happiness and his involvement in other pursuits is why it would be another 10 years before Kandinsky added another painting to the Compositions series. He gained citizenship in Germany in 1928 and seemed contented in his new homeland until 1933 when Bauhaus was one of the early casualties of the Nazi government. He then moved to France where his Composition IX was definitely influence d by the surrealists gaining popularity there (Harden, 1995). After Composition IX was completed in 1936, Europe once again became an ugly place to live and in 1937, 57 of Kandinsky’s works were seized by the Nazi government.(Guggenheim, 2007). Some, like the first three Composition pieces, were destroyed.Two years later, in 1939, Kandinsky completed the series, breaking from all the previous works and creating his work on a field of black. Given his earlier statements about the color and the loss of his other works, it is no doubt a reflection of the very pain in Kandinsky’s soul brought on by the second World War. â€Å"The outstanding characteristic of Composition X is obviously the stark, black ground. The colors and forms appear particularly sharp against the black background. The brilliance of the colored shapes brings to mind the cutouts done by Matisse over a decade later.The movement of the forms is distinctly upward and outward from both sides of a central a xis running through the book-like form near the top of the canvas. This movement enhances the evocation of hot-air balloon forms rising into an infinite space. The round form between the book shape and the brown balloon shape has a lunar feel to it that even conveys a feeling of literal â€Å"outer space†. Kandinsky had always expressed a strong dislike for the color black and it is significant that he chose it as the dominating color of his last major artistic statement.† (Harden, 1995).Ultimately, the reviewer is right and the final Composition is kandinsky’s statement about his loss and the world at war. â€Å"For Kandinsky, if that objective element of a painting were taken away, the building blocks of the composition would reveal themselves to cause a feeling of repose and tranquil repetition, of well-balanced parts.† (Dabrowski, 1995).  Ã‚   The artist spent a lifetime telling the world that he disliked the color black and that his work was all abo ut the symbolism and the meaning behind the painting itself.   It makes perfect sense then that his final major work would be about death itself and the life that has been interposed over it. Whether Kandinsky knew that Compositions X would be among his final works is not clear.What is clear is that death too is symbolic of loss and pain, emotions that the highly spiritual Kadinsky could not help but feel when his work was captured by the Nazi regime. Perhaps more so than even the usual artist, Kandinsky was tied to his art, deeply and emotional. That they were an expression of his belief system and his very soul make the loss of the first three Compositions even more tragic.Sadly, World War II was a horrible time for the great works, with many works of art lost forever to the savages of war. The difference in Kandinsky’s work, as opposed to other great masters, is that the artist was still alive and he was able to present one last finale, to express the pain and rage and t he destruction and to show that life, even without art, must sometimes go on.WORKS CITEDDabrowski, Magdelena. â€Å"Kandinsky:Compositions† Museum of Modern art: New York, 1995.â€Å"Geggenheim Museum†, http://www.guggenheimcollection.org/site/artist_bio_71.html, November 14, 2007Harden, Mark. â€Å"Kandinsky: Compositions† http://www.glyphs.com/art/kandinsky/, November 14, 2007.Long, Rose-Carol Washton. â€Å"Kandinsky's Abstract Style: The Veiling of Apocalyptic Folk Imagery†,Art Journal > Vol. 34, No. 3 (Spring, 1975), pp. 217-228 Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0004-3249%28197521%2934%3A3%3C217%3AKASTVO%3E2.0.CO%3B2-4 , November 14, 2007.â€Å"Wassily Kandinsky† November 14, 2007.

Thursday, January 2, 2020

The three types of Compensation and Benefits - 1189 Words

The three types of Compensation and Benefits analyzed through this research are Shared Base Compensation dealing with stock option and restricted stock, Regular Base Compensation and Pension Plans. Laura Santos ACG4111/ Intermediate Accounting II February 2014 Compensation and Benefits comes in many different forms. The major goal for compensation and benefits is to reward employees for services provided by an individual for the benefit of the organization. It’s a set of programs, aiming to achieve and attract capable workers to a particular business. Compensation and benefits also helps motivate employees towards superior performance and retaining these services for a long period of time. There is†¦show more content†¦This type of compensation is designed to provide income during retirement. There are two different types of plans, defined benefit pension or defined contribution pension plans. Both plans have advantages, disadvantages, accounting policies and disclosures are applicable. It is a requirement of management to prepare pension statements according to the Statement of Recommended Practices (SORP). The accounting policies should be clearly explained in the notes for each material item and include accruals, expendi tures, investment income, benefits and payments. Consistency of accounting treatment between periods is a fundamental accounting concept and changes should not be made unless justifiable and disclosed with a reason. The notes disclosed should be in relation to the investment at market value to include profits, deposits and equities to name a few. The advantages and disadvantage can differ depending on which plan the employee choose. The defined benefit plan is simple; funds are calculated based on years of service, annual compensation and age. With this plan you don’t have to worry about investing money or market price fluctuations. The benefit plan gives a sense of ease that your benefit will remain unchanged because it is at set rate during retirement. Everything is based on calculations and the company is responsible for assuring that benefits are distributed to the retiree;Show MoreRelatedCompensation and Benefits1695 Words   |  7 Pages | |Compensation and Benefits | |Human Resource Management Coures | | Employee compensation and benefits are critical factors in the new hire acceptance process andRead MoreThree Forms of Compulsory Insurance1031 Words   |  4 PagesThere are three forms of compulsory insurance that are extremely beneficial to claimants in general. These compulsory insurance provide a foundation of financial reprieve to the employee of a company as a result of unemployment, accidents and injuries. 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