Simulation in digital forensic education

The paper starts by describing the role of simulation and role play in education and training. A variety of examples, such as flight simulation, medical simulation,military personnel and stress, simulation in computer science education. The core definition of simulation is that it allows students to explore a problem area in a safe and controlled environment. We contrast different approaches, such as high versus low fidelity simulation. Virtual worlds represent one strand of simulation, and have been used in education to teach a variety of subjects. Simulation is already used in many areas of the forensic subject area, for example by giving students suspect disks to analyse, asking them to seize a computer system in different scenarios, or delivering evidence in a simulated court. Forensic simulation both teaches cognitive practical skills, and acts to reduce the anxiety related to working as a digital forensics practitioner. We are evaluating the use of virtual worlds to extend the range of convenience of forensic simulation and to allow a larger range of scenarios to be used. A comparison of 'role playing' and automated simulation will be undertaken. We anticipate that for a given development cost a larger variety of scenarios can be used with students, and that more autonomous and learning from a distance can be used. During the academic year 2009-2010 we intend to build a series of forensic simulations, using two different virtual world systems, Second Life (Linden Labs) (a widely used Internet virtual world 'built by the denizens of second life') and Wonderland (Sun Microsystems) (a closed local virtual world, which allows a virtual environment to be run locally behind a firewall). Conventional role playing simulations will also be used.