In Need of credible computer 'expert' - Willing to pay!!

[the latest member]

OK, I know it sounds like a lonely hearts ad, but I am serious about this.

Essentially I need a person who is not only very credible but also reasonably well qualified in the matters of computers/computer security, ie, MSCE, to attend a county court appeals hearing in October.

The brief history of the case, is that I have originally won the matter in March of this year after an 18 month struggle, during which we had to wait 6 months while the other party had his world cruise. After the judge made his statement in which he awarded me all the claim, costs and interest the other party stated he was going to appeal. Me and judge were not amused but he has managed to get the appeal on the basis that he didnt have his expert witness present.

Obviously for the appeal he surely intends to bring this expert and my solicitor has advised me that I need to discredit this expert in order to win my case.

The history is quite long and involved and I will not post it here. Suffice to say that the person I am dealing with is a low life and according to those in the know this is typical of him, ie, delaying tactics etc, appeals and so on in the hope that those in my position will give in.

Well, seeing as there is in the region of £3,000 at stake I am not about to give in, so I will be attending the hearing in October.

My request is for someone who is credible and willing enough to attend with me as my expert witness to convince the court that I have done everything correctly and properly. Preferably if that person is MSCE qualified or experienced in security issues would be ideal as the argument is over computer security - he claims Windows XP security policies is not secure enough to prevent users (not Administrators) hacking the Administrator settings. I beleive it is, but this is where my expertise ends, hence my request.

I konw this is a very brief outline of the situation and if enough people request it I shall post the full details. The hearing is scheduled for mid October in Swansea. I am willing to pay expenses so please if anyone is interested I would request that you PM me.

Thanks in advance.

LM

[rustle]

...the argument is over computer security - he claims Windows XP security policies is not secure enough to prevent users (not Administrators) hacking the Administrator settings. I beleive it is, but this is where my expertise ends, hence my request.
With respect, I don't fancy your chances of winning that argument again if he brings along a credible expert.

Give me your secure XP machine for 5 minutes and I'll give you or change the administrator's documents/settings or change the local admin password and do whatever I like.*

*Slightly more difficult if the BIOS is protected and/or there's no CD drive - I might need 7 minutes: 2 to go and grab a CD-reader;)

XP security is a deterrent; logs might show what's been done; but it isn't "preventive" per se.

There must be (a lot) more to this than you've let on so far...

Good luck!

[BRL]

I know this is a very brief outline of the situation and if enough people request it I shall post the full details. I would not do this. Bad idea, if people want to know I would advise them to PM you for the information.

Rustle has offered to help, I would stick with him if I were you.

Good luck.

[the latest member]

Yup, sound advice and I would be very cautious of posting the whole story. By the way, CDRom drives were disconnected, so Rustle you got your 7 minutes.

The stupid thing is that we offered this place additional security but they refused on the grounds that they ddnt want to pay more on top of the price they were forking out.

Since it has back fired on them they are now resorting to this approach. I have won my case in court once already, now need to do it again and have to manage to discredit his expert witness (I am assuming the witness is appropriately qualified but am taking no chances) in order to beat his appeal.

Yes, there is much more to this, in fact the file is a good 1 inch thick, but due to the amount of money involved I am keen to ensure that I go in fully prepared and with credible answers to all the objections they raise. Remeber its only a small claims court and hopefully the judge will not be that familiar with computer security issues.

[Conan the Librarian]

One thing here might be that the whole IT issue is rather woolly and it depends whose expert witness is more credible. Remember, they will supposedly be presenting to "Lay" persons and as such, it is maybe not going to be a case of whose witness is more knowledgeable, but whose is the better communicator.

If £3K rides on this, I would be prepared to spend just that to get the "right" expert. Should you win and I hope that you will - then money well spent. A nerd is of no use to anyone other than a nerd.


Be positive!(Then bite their balls off)

Conan

[bladewashout]

Obviously you've already been to a court, and at sub 5k that was probably small claims.

My experience has been that the judge is unlikely to be an expert him/herself, and will be listening to both 'experts' on the basis of what an ordinary person would take from the advice/services/products promised vs what was delivered.

If the claimant has acted reasonably in the judge's view, and the defendant has acted unreasonably, then the appeal will probably fail. My unqualified approach to small claims court cases has always been to try and show that what I have done as a claimant has been what any reasonable person would do, with a broad set of criteria rather than one single showstopper. I then try to demonstrate that the defendant has done or omitted to do things which would have given me an opportunity to avoid whatever I am claiming about, or not buy the service or whatever, i.e. not losing the money I paid.

A showstopper is great to have, but you need a backup showing a generally distasteful set of actions by the defendant. That way you can obtain the benefit of the doubt when the judge makes his decision.



BW

[rustle]

I must admit to being a little confused by these two, seemingly contradictory, statements:
...the argument is over computer security - he claims Windows XP security policies is not secure enough to prevent users (not Administrators) hacking the Administrator settings. I beleive it is, but this is where my expertise ends, hence my request.
The stupid thing is that we offered this place additional security but they refused on the grounds that they ddnt want to pay more on top of the price they were forking out.
On the one hand you seem to advocate XP security as sufficient; on the other you seem to be offering "enhanced security" for an additional fee...

If I have misunderstood then I apologise, and if you don't want to go into detail on here please PM me if you want an unbiased view [unbiased views are "free to good homes" ;)] :)