UCD CCI has been home to the FREETOOL project since 2013. Freetool is currently collaborating with EACTDA (European Anti-Cybercrime Technology Development Association) under the Tools4LEAs project, continuing development on a range of free cybercrime investigation tools tailored to support specific LEA requirements in digital investigations and analysis. Ten tools have been developed by a community of skilled developers and expert users including volunteers from a range of countries in Europe. Tools are developed in partnership with law enforcement, and are freely available to the law enforcement community. The tools cover the phases of an investigation from pre-search Open Source Intelligence Gathering (OSINT) to Live data forensics, Memory Analysis, post-search OSINT and online resource preservation, and automated file/artefact retrieval and forensic reporting, as well as media processing and geolocation of artefacts and media comparison with cross-case media matching.
3000 users from over 100 Law Enforcement Agencies spread across dozens of jurisdictions have signed up for access to the tools, which have also been adopted at an organisational level by several LEAs, and have been used in high-profile investigations as well as featuring in ECTEG (European Cybercrime Training and Education Group) training material.
Background
The project’s goal is to address the need for customised tools, developed by LE for LE and to make them available for free, mindful that budgetary restrictions are common-place. One objective was to form a community of skilled developers to develop, update and support the tools, and to then to harmonise and enhance the outputs.
Further Development
Further development of the FREETOOL project is continuing in collaboration with EACTDA and the Tools4LEAs project, funded by the ISF Police Programme GA 101036219. The Tools4LEAs project aims at establishing a long-term and sustainable structure that delivers on a regular basis tools that are ready to be used at operational level by European public security practitioners (law enforcement agencies (LEA) and others), primarily in their digital investigations. These tools will have no license costs for European public security practitioners.
This project was funded by the European Union's Internal Security Fund - Police
Project ID: FREETOOL v3.0
Call ID: ISFP-2017-AG-CYBER
Reference ID: 821947
For further information contact (opens in a new window)freetool@ucd.ie
You can self-register at (opens in a new window)thefreetoolproject.eu using your law enforcement email account if your law enforcement agency's domain has already been white-listed.
(opens in a new window)Freetool Project Website.
News
150 International Law Enforcement Attend First FREETOOL Testathon (April 2019)