Was a crucial photo genuine or "amended"?:
Background:
A bullying at work case involved a photo which was alleged to have been taken at work on a specific date.
My involvement:
I was asked to look at several aspects of the evidence but, in particular, the photo.
I discovered that the photo was doctored together from two photos, the original, which probably was taken at work, and a totally different photo, which was taken near the alleged perpetrator's house on a different day.
Not many people realise the amount of information that is stored in a modern digital photograph. Along with all the information to rebuild and display the photograph, is a lot of information about where, when and how it was taken. This is stored invisibly in a hidden area of the file, part of which is referred to as EXIF (Exchangeable Image File) data.
What is stored depends on which device was used to take the photo but will definitely include the time and date (as set on the device) that the photo was taken. It will almost certainly include the make and model number of the phone or camera. It will include settings such as aperture, type of lens and whether the flash was fired. It might even include the serial number of the camera and the exact GPS location at the time of the photo.
In order to prove to the court that the photo in this case was a fake, I created a photo of the cover of "The Radio Times" dated "in the future". I'm not going to tell anyone how to do that because it may assist criminals. Suffice to say that I made it look as if the May 2020 copy had been photographed long before it had been published!
If you have photos as part of your evidence, I may be able to discover significant discrepancies in the data therein. When the data is "amended" there is usually an evidence trail left behind.