Digital Forensics Validation Service is the national provision of validation materials and ground truth data, hosted on the Central Validation Library to support forces and forensic units with compliance and accreditation.
The Library is available to police forces in England and Wales.
How it works
The Central Validation Library provides a range of resources and materials to support forces with using digital forensics capabilities. This service is maintained by the PDS’s Forensics Portfolio.
It is aimed at forces’ Digital Forensics Units and also for Forensic Science specialists.
Watch this video about the Central Validation Library on our YouTube channel to learn more about this solution.
Benefits
The Central Validation Library serves as a hub for information and activities conducted during a force’s local validation process in digital forensics. It offers a single point of reference for essential materials, including policy documents, guidelines, and procedural templates. These resources are intended to:
- Simplify the adoption of best practices and support accreditation in forensics work.
- Promote adherence to International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO) standards for forensics, enhancing national and international consistency, and efficiency.
- Introduce opportunities for standardised approaches to working with common forensic tools on a national scale.
Learn more about member benefits on our dedicated Members page.
What we need
- Details of the digital forensics software in use.
- Intended validation scope and tool configuration.
- Named contacts for coordination.
- Agreement to validation process and data handling.
- Access to relevant forensic systems (if applicable).
What you get
- Validation plans.
- Validation reports.
- Digital forensic device extractions.
- Associated documentation for your force’s digital forensics software tool(s).
Use cases
EMSOU (East Midlands Special Operations Unit) needed to validate a mobile device extraction tool as part of its ISO accreditation renewal. By using the Digital Forensics Validation Service, the force was able to access nationally created validation materials and ground truth data from the Central Validation Library. This saved significant time and resources, and reduced the risk and effort required in maintaining and creating local validation materials.
