characteristics of the image acquisition device or technology) and malicious post-processing or tampering (which aim is for instance to verify the integrity of particular features) . Illicit drug profiling, which refers to the systematic extraction and storage of chemical attributes of drugs seized in order to obtain indications on the manufacture and distribution processes, the size and the evolution of the market). Forensic Information Technology (forensic IT), which refers to the analysis of the digital traces that people leave when using information technology. Offender profiling i.e. psychological profiling of the criminal. Issues The use of profiling techniques represents threats to the privacy of the individual and to the protection of fundamental freedoms. Indeed, criminal data, i.e., data which are collected and processed for suppressing criminal offences, often consists of personal data. One of the issues is the re-use of personal data collected within one criminal investigation for another purpose than the one for which it was collected. An example from the book, “The Psychology and Sociology of Wrongful Convictions: Forensic Science Reform,” there was a profiling error, in which this woman was raped and slaughtered by a serial killer. The suspect was named the Boston Strangler and investigators worked hard in trying to gather a profile for this criminal. Experts eventually came up with the Boston Strangler being two people and that both men lived alone, most likely schoolteachers, and one of them was homosexual. The criminal finally confessed to the crime and his DNA matched up with the scene, but his profile didn’t fit the crime. The profile the experts came up with didn’t match any characteristics of the killer (pp.6). Creating profiles just creates tunnel vision because investigators will be focusing on finding a specific individual that the profile fits, when in reality, the profiling system is insanely flawed and is considered useless to the investigators. Several methods-including technical, legal, and behavioral-are available to address some of the issues associated with forensic profiling. For instance, in Europe the European Convention on Human Rights provides a number of instruments for the Protection of Individuals with regard to Automatic Processing of Personal Data. See also Forensic identification Profiling (disambiguation) Use of social network websites in investigations References Offender profiling Profiling