Call for Papers

18th International Workshop on Digital Forensics
(WSDF 2025)
https://2025.ares-conference.eu/program/wsdf/
to be held in conjunction with the 20th International Conference on Availability, Reliability and Security (ARES 2025 – http://2025.ares-conference.eu)
August 11-14, 2025 (Ghent, Belgium)

Workshop Description

Digital forensics is a rapidly evolving field primarily focused on the extraction, preservation and analysis of digital evidence in a manner suitable for presentation in a court of law, or for other legal proceedings and formal investigations.
The ubiquitous nature of digital devices in modern life and the opportunities provided by the “cyber space” present many avenues for criminal activity that directly involve, or are facilitated by, such established technologies. On the other hand, new technologies emerge at an ever-rapid pace and become more accessible – many of which represent novel challenges for digital forensics, enlarging the scope for research and development.
WSDF aims to bring together experts from academia, industry, government and law enforcement who are interested in advancing the state of the art in digital forensics by exchanging their knowledge, results, ideas, challenges, best practices and experiences. The aim of the workshop is to provide a relaxed atmosphere that promotes discussion and free exchange of ideas while providing a sound academic backing. Its focus is not only restricted to technical digital forensics but WSDF also welcomes investigative related topics in policing, criminology, law and behavioural sciences.

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:

Digital Evidence Extraction and Analysis
Network Forensics
Anti-Forensics Techniques
Memory Forensics
Digital Forensics of immersive technologies (AR/MR/VR/XR)
Cyber Terrorism and Warfare
Log Analysis and Malware Analysis
Incident Response and Management
Best Practices and Case Studies
AI to enhance investigation capabilities (e.g., Natural Language Generation (NLG), Large Language Models (LLMs))
AI applications/benefits for policing
Digital Forensics of AI-based systems
Quality assurance in investigations
Certification of Digital Forensics labs Multimedia Forensics
Cyber Criminal Profiling
Big Data in Digital Forensics
Digital Forensics datasets
Digital Forensics education
Cloud Forensics
Mobile & Drone Forensics
Emerging challenges in Digital Forensics
eDiscovery
Open Source Intelligence (OSINT)
Cybercrime investigations
AI-generated evidence (trends, authentication)
Evidence gathering in adversarial attacks
AI-generated child abuse material
Investigations involving Generative AI
Legal and court challenges of deepfakes
Pattern-of-life Analysis

Workshop Chairs

▪ Virginia Franqueira
University of Kent, UK

▪ Andrew Marrington
Zayed University, UAE

▪ Richard Overill
King’s College London, UK

▪ Martin Steinebach
Fraunhofer Institute SIT, DE

▪ Kim-Kwang Raymond Choo
University of Texas, US

Program Committee

Frank Breitinger, University of Augsburg, DE
Ching Bon Raymond Chan, Singapore Institute of Technology, SG
Sarah De'Ath, De Montfort University, UK
Patricio Domingues, Polytechnic Institute of Leiria, PT
Weihan Goh, Singapore Institute of Technology, SG
George Grispos, University of Nebraka, US
Chris Hargreaves, HARGS Solutions Ltd, UK
Katerina Kanta, University of Portsmouth, UK
Erisa Karafili, University of Southampton, UK
Áine MacDermott, Liverpool John Moores University, UK
Chiara Pero, University of Salerno, IT
Mark Scanlon, University College Dublin, IE
Stavros Shiaeles, University of Portsmouth, UK
Hudan Studiawan, Institut Teknologi Sepuluh Nopember, ID
Harm van Beek, Netherlands Forensic Institute, NL
Jeroen van den Bos, Infix Technologies, NL
Vincent van der Meer, Zuyd University, NL

Best Paper Award

The Institute of Cyber Security for Society (iCSS) (cyber.kent.ac.uk), University of Kent (UK), will sponsor the best paper award. The decision criterion will consider both the paper and the oral presentation quality.

Submission Guidelines

The submission guidelines valid for the workshop are the same as for the ARES conference. Refer to the lower half of https://2025.ares-conference.eu/call-for-papers/