Sam Raincock 

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Sam Raincock
Eur Ing Samantha Raincock BSc (Hons), MSc, CISSP, MCSFS, MBCS, FEWI, CEng FIET

Sam Raincock is a Chartered Engineer and a Fellow of both the Expert Witness Institute and the Institution of Engineering and Technology.  She has worked as a digital forensics consultant/expert witness, and an Information/IT security specialist for over 20 years and in that time she has prepared over 800 reports/statements and opinions in digital evidence cases for Courts in the UK and Ireland including cases heard in the Old Bailey and Central Criminal Court/Combined Court in Dublin.  This includes cases which are criminal, civil and family matters including working as a joint expert with a specialism working in complex criminal cases.  She has provided verbal testimony in England (Crown and Magistrate) and in Ireland (Criminal Court) and conducted a considerable number of case conferences with barristers including Kings' Counsels (QC/KC) and Senior Counsels (SC).  She has also been involved in over 50 expert witness meetings including preparing joint or similar statements for Courts.   A list of some of Sam's previous cases is available.

In the computing forensics field, Sam is instructed to investigate complex cases involving technical usage and/or defences including use of encryption, multiple device (including phone handset use/backups), use of wiper software, hacking/viruses, and commenting on the validity of a proposed defence/scenario.  In the telecommunications field, she is instructed in cell site analysis involving determining the locality of a mobile telephone at the time of its past connections.  She also performs the evaluation of evidence involving the content of phones, connection records, connection behavioural analysis and attribution evidence.  Sam can also assess location based evidence including from GPS/Sat Nav/Tracker device and vehicles including determining the accuracy and combining with other evidence.  She also performs assessments in cases involving both telecommunications and computer evidence as well as comparing/combining location-based evidence.

Sam also provides experimentation with mobile telephones, digital devices and software/web sites to determine their functionality particularly to ascertain the prevalence of evidence in legal cases.  She also provides security assessments for legal cases sometimes involving making assessments of attributing particular actions to person(s) and in the process of this has evaluated the policies and procedures of a number of large organisations.

Sam can deal with various bespoke systems/data and being a computer programmer for over 20 years and specialising in large amounts of data processing and analysis meaning she is able to prepare bespoke solutions to solve arising questions/issues in cases.   She has also prepared bespoke software to assist within the cell site analysis and telecommunications analysis and is actively researching and developing in the area.    Since August 2020 this has also involved examining the data involved in Operation Venetic (Encro Phones/EncroChat).   She has also worked on a range of other cases testing computer based systems.

Prior to forming Sam Raincock Consultancy in 2009 (incorporated 2011) Sam worked for a forensic consultancy firm where she was Head of Digital Forensics.

Sam currently has the following qualifications:  
  • BSc (First Class Honours) in Computer Science from the University of Durham.
  • MSc (Research) in Computer Science from the University of Durham.
  • Certified Information Systems Security Professional - Member of (ISC)2.
  • Member of the British Computer Society.
  • Member of the Chartered Society of Forensic Sciences.
  • European Engineer with the FEANI.
  • Chartered Engineer.
  • Fellow of the Expert Witness Institute.
  • Fellow of the Institution of Engineering and Technology.     
At the start of her career, Sam received advanced/expert level training in the use of various forensic software and has been using such software for over 19 years.  She receives technical training, and is actively researching within various fields of digital forensics.   In the past few years, Sam has completing more than 150 hours of bespoke research and development (including of bespoke computer programs/scripts) within computer/phone forensics and more than 2000 hours relating to Operation Venetic (since 2020).   She has been computer programming for over 25 years.

She has also received training in various areas of information security including decryption, security of systems and security management systems.   This includes the following:

  • Certified ISO 27001 Implementation Practitioner (Distinction). 
  • Certified Security Incident Specialist (Distinction). 
  • Training for and completion of Certified Information Systems Security Professional (examination passed first time) - CISSP is stated to be a World recognised premier cybersecurity certification and involves knowledge of a broad spectrum of information security areas.
  • Certificate of Successful Completion of the Information Security Management Systems Auditor/Lead Auditor Course (ISO 27001).
Sam is an experienced expert which is also demonstrated from her previous case list.