6 Ways to Save Time in Digital Investigations

Investigations rarely slow down because of one major obstacle. More often, time is lost gradually throughout the process: waiting for someone to be available for interview, travelling to meet a witness, arranging an interpreter, writing up conversations, transferring evidence between systems or checking whether a digital file can be trusted.

On their own, these delays might seem relatively minor, but across an investigation, a team or an entire organisation, they can quickly add up.

Digital technology cannot replace experienced investigators or good investigative practice, nor should it. What it can do is simplify some of the processes around an investigation, reducing unnecessary administration and helping people, evidence and information move more quickly.

Here are six areas where that can make a real difference.

01. Interview People Sooner, Wherever They Are

Getting the right person interviewed at the right time is not always straightforward. Witnesses, victims, claimants, specialists and other parties may be spread across different locations, difficult to reach or unable to attend in person. When different languages are involved, arranging an interview can become even more dependent on travel, diaries and interpreter availability.

Secure remote interviewing can make that process much easier.

MeaConnexus allows investigators to conduct interviews remotely through a browser, while real-time translation supports conversations between participants speaking different languages. Up to five languages can be used simultaneously, with translated text displayed during the conversation.

There will, of course, be circumstances where a professional interpreter is necessary. However, where real-time translation is appropriate, it can prevent an interview being delayed simply because an interpreter is unavailable.

Ultimately, it means investigators can get to important conversations sooner, without location or language automatically becoming a barrier.

 

02. Spend Less Time Writing Up and More Time Investigating

An hour-long interview can create considerably more than an hour’s work. Once the conversation has finished, investigators may still need to review the recording, locate important comments, produce notes or transcripts and identify anything that requires further action.

Across several interviews, that administration can take up a significant amount of time that could otherwise be spent progressing the investigation.

MeaConnexus and MeaFuse can automatically produce transcripts from recorded content, with time-coding that allows investigators to see when something was said and return directly to that part of the recording. Instead of repeatedly reviewing an entire interview, they can quickly locate the information they need.

An automatic summary can also provide an initial overview of the key points, issues raised and potential lines of enquiry. Investigators still have access to the full time-coded transcript and original recording whenever they need to check the detail or verify exactly what was said.

Within MeaConnexus, speakers can also be identified in the transcript, making longer or more complex conversations easier to follow.

None of this replaces an investigator’s judgement. It simply makes the information easier to work with, reducing the time spent preparing notes and searching through recordings so that more time can be spent on the investigation itself.

 

0.3 Get Evidence Into the Investigation Faster

Capturing evidence is only part of the process. It also needs to reach the people who need to work with it.

Traditional processes can put several steps between evidence being captured and becoming available to the investigation team. Images may remain on a device, documents may need scanning and files may need to be manually transferred or uploaded once somebody returns to the office.

Each extra step takes time and creates another potential point of delay.

With MeaFuse, authorised users can capture images, video and audio on a mobile device and securely upload the material directly into the platform. Evidence gathered in the field can therefore become available to authorised colleagues without waiting for the person who captured it to return to the office or transfer it between devices.

That can make a meaningful difference in a time-sensitive investigation. Earlier access to a piece of evidence might reveal another line of enquiry, raise a question that needs answering or change what an investigator decides to do next.

Put simply, the sooner useful information reaches the investigation team, the sooner they can act on it.

 

0.4 Know Your Digital Evidence Hasn’t Been Altered

Digital evidence is increasingly easy to create, copy, edit and manipulate. As a result, presenting a digital file may no longer be enough on its own. Investigators and organisations may also need to demonstr ate where that file came from and whether it has changed since it was captured.

If those questions only arise later, establishing authenticity can create additional work, slow proceedings and undermine confidence in otherwise valuable evidence.

MeaConnexus and MeaFuse are designed to help establish evidential integrity from the outset. Cryptographic hashing and blockchain-based validation create a verifiable record that can be used to demonstrate whether digital material remains consistent with the original captured or recorded file.

Rather than simply assuming that the file being viewed has not changed, investigators and other authorised parties have a way to validate it.

As digital manipulation becomes easier and more accessible, being able to show why evidence should be trusted is increasingly important. Establishing that integrity from the beginning also reduces the need to piece it together retrospectively if the evidence is challenged later.

 

0.5 Capture Accounts While the Detail Is Still Fresh

Sometimes the delay in taking an account has very little to do with the investigation itself. The difficulty is simply getting everyone into the same place at the same time.

Travel, shift patterns, geography, room availability and competing diaries can turn a relatively straightforward interview into something that takes days to arrange. The longer that takes, the greater the risk that details are forgotten or recollections become less clear.

MeaConnexus allows secure interviews to take place remotely using desktop, tablet or mobile devices, without requiring participants to download dedicated software. This gives investigators another way to speak to someone sooner when meeting face to face is not necessary.

There will always be interviews where physical attendance is operationally or evidentially important. But where travelling to a location adds little value to the interview itself, removing that requirement can help investigators gather an account while the details are still fresh.

 

0.6 Go From Contact to Interview in Minutes, Not Days

Investigations do not always move according to a convenient schedule. A witness might unexpectedly become available, a new line of enquiry could identify someone who needs to be contacted quickly, or a specialist may need to join a conversation already in progress.

In those situations, even relatively small administrative tasks can get in the way. Setting up meetings, exchanging emails, sending joining instructions and coordinating participants all add steps between deciding an interview needs to happen and actually having the conversation.

MeaConnexus includes rapid interview capabilities that allow participants to be invited directly by SMS or email. Additional participants can also be brought into an interview while it is already underway.

It is a relatively simple capability, but an important one: fewer steps between identifying the need for an interview and speaking to the person involved. For teams dealing with fast-moving enquiries, that flexibility can be far more useful than simply having another video meeting platform.

 

Give Investigators More Time to Investigate

Technology will not replace the judgement, experience or skills of an investigator, but it can remove some of the tasks surrounding an investigation that consume time without adding much investigative value.

That might mean less travelling and waiting, less manual transcription and note-taking, fewer unnecessary evidence transfers and faster access to the people and information needed to move an investigation forward. At the same time, investigators can have greater confidence that the digital evidence they are relying on is consistent with what was originally captured.

On a single investigation, those efficiencies might save a few hours. Across hundreds or thousands of interviews, evidence submissions and investigations, the impact becomes much greater, creating additional investigative capacity without simply asking teams to do more with the same resources.

For organisations facing growing demand and finite resources, that capacity matters.

MeaConnexus provides secure, evidential remote interviewing with capabilities including rapid interview initiation, transcription, automatic interview summaries, real-time translation and independently verifiable interview records.

MeaFuse enables investigators and other authorised users to securely capture, manage, share and validate digital evidence while maintaining a clear record of its provenance and chain of custody.

Together, they are designed to take unnecessary friction out of the investigative process while protecting something that cannot be compromised: confidence in the evidence itself.

See how MeaConnexus and MeaFuse can help streamline your digital evidence workflow.

Read our latest MeaConnexus infographic which provides an idea of how much you can save if you conduct 500 interviews a year. Also, read our article on how to reduce the time spent investigating.