Episode 138 | Just NIST’s Digital Forensics Black Box Study

In episode six, Just Science interviews Barbara Guttman from the National Institute of Standards and Technology about the first large-scale black box study to test the accuracy of computer and mobile phone forensics.

In forensic science, black box studies are used to measure the reliability of methods and techniques that rely on human interpretation. Barbara Guttman and her team at NIST are working to measure the overall competency of the digital forensics community at large by releasing an open-enrollment online test available to interested forensic scientists. Listen along as she discusses the parameters of the test, the expected results, and the value of the study in this episode of Just Science. 

This episode of Just Science is funded by the National Institute of Justice’s Forensic Technology Center of Excellence [Award 2016-MU-BX-K110].

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GUEST BIO

Barbara Guttman is the Manager of the Software Quality Group in NIST’s Information Technology Lab (ITL).  Her areas of responsibility include software assurance and computer forensics.  In computer forensics, her group runs the National Software Reference Library www.nsrl.nist.gov and the Computer Forensics Tool Testing Project www.cftt.nist.gov.   She is also active in both the Scientific Working Group on Digital Evidence and the OSAC DE Subcommittee.  She has been working in the area for 20 years.  In software assurance, her group runs the Software Assurance Metrics and Tool Evaluation (SAMATE) project including the Static Analysis Tool Exposition and the SAMATE Reference Data Set.

Prior to joining the Software Quality Group, she was Associate Director of ITL, Senior Program Analyst to the NIST Director, and worked in computer security and federal information policy.