Trusted computing and forensic investigations

The concept of 'trusted computing' has been developed to make computers trustworthy. However, the methods used to achieve this aim may cause problems to digital investigators in the future. The purpose of this short essay is to provide a brief outline of 'trusted computing', and to illustrate some of the problems that may occur in the future. This essay is speculative in nature. It was written at the request of the editor with the intention of raising awareness, rather than providing a definitive view of the problems that investigators and lawyers may face in the future. The reader is requested to treat the content as the opening of a debate, rather than a diligent discussion of the subject matter. The Trusted Computing Group was set up with a view to pioneer the concept that a computer should work in accordance with an expectation. The Group aims to achieve this expectation by putting in place mechanisms to attest to the state of the software applications that run under an operating system and upon a hardware platform (for a detailed explanation, the reader is directed to 'TCG Specification Architecture Overview' Revision 1.2 dated 28 April 2004, available in electronic format on the Trusted Computing Group web site -https://www.trustedcomputinggroup.org/home).