Haystack Intake — Aaron Sutherland

1 Your Lab

Tell me about where you work and what you do.

What agency do you work for and what is your role/title?

How large is your lab? (examiners, support staff, supervisors)

What geographic jurisdiction do you cover?

What types of cases does your lab handle most?

Roughly how many cases do you process per month or year?

What is your current case backlog and average wait time?

2 Your Workflow

Walk me through how you actually do the work.

Walk me through a case from intake to final report — every step

What tools do you use for evidence extraction? (check all that apply)

Cellebrite Axiom (Magnet Forensics) EnCase FTK (Forensic Toolkit) Oxygen Forensics UFED (Cellebrite) Other

What does your evidence review process look like after extraction?

How long does a typical case take from intake to final report?

Where does the most time get spent? What is the biggest bottleneck?

3 Pain Points

I want to know where the job actually hurts.

What part of the job is most mentally draining or repetitive?

What evidence types are hardest or most time-consuming to process?

What worries you most about your current process from a legal/compliance standpoint?

Have you ever had evidence challenged in court because of process issues?

Yes No

What do you wish you had more time to do?

4 Data & Evidence Types

What you're working with day to day.

What are the most common device types you examine? (check all that apply)

iPhone Android Windows PC Mac Tablets External drives / USB Cloud accounts Other

What data types do you see most? (check all that apply)

SMS / texts Emails Photos Videos App data Location data Financial records Social media Other

Do you handle encrypted devices? How do you approach that?

Do you process social media or cloud-based evidence? How?

Are there data types you currently can't process well that you wish you could?

5 Legal & Compliance

The standards and requirements that govern your work.

What chain of custody procedures does your lab follow?

What compliance standards or certifications does your lab hold? (check all that apply)

ASCLD ISO 17025 SWGDE guidelines None currently Other

What do prosecutors typically require from your reports?

Are digital signatures or electronic documentation accepted in your jurisdiction?

Yes No Sometimes / depends on the court

What are the biggest legal risks in your current process?

6 Technology

Your tech stack and infrastructure.

What case management software do you use?

What operating systems do your workstations run?

Is your evidence processing air-gapped or connected to a network?

Air-gapped Connected to network Mixed (some air-gapped, some connected)

What are your retention and destruction policies for evidence data?

Any IT restrictions that would affect new software deployment?

7 Your Expertise

Your background and personal skill set.

How many years have you been in digital forensics?

What certifications do you hold? (check all that apply)

CFCE (Certified Forensic Computer Examiner) CCE (Certified Computer Examiner) EnCE (EnCase Certified Examiner) GCFE (GIAC Certified Forensic Examiner) GCFA (GIAC Certified Forensic Analyst) Other

Have you testified as an expert witness?

Yes — frequently Yes — occasionally No

What types of cases are you personally best at?

Are there areas of forensics you want to expand into?

8 The AI System

Let's figure out how Johnny 5 fits into your world.

What would you most want Johnny 5 to help you with first?

What would make the biggest difference in your daily workflow?

What concerns you about AI in an evidence context?

Accuracy / hallucination Legal defensibility Bias in analysis Chain of custody implications Data security / evidence exposure Other

What would you NEVER want the AI to do without human review?

What does success look like at 90 days with this system?

📎 Upload Lab Documents (Optional)

Share anything that would help Johnny 5 learn your lab — case report templates, SOPs, chain of custody forms, training materials, redacted case examples, vendor documentation.

📁 Open My Document Folder →

Opens Google Drive in a new tab. No Google account required to upload.

Welcome, Aaron

📎 Upload Lab Documents (Optional)

You're in, Aaron.