Guidance Software Inc., a leader in Digital Investigations, has announced it is celebrating its 15th anniversary this month.

Shawn McCreight, now chairman and chief technology officer, founded Guidance Software in 1997 and introduced EnCase, a digital forensic software solution. The invention of EnCase would spawn an industry, help law enforcement pursue and intercept criminals, and lead to important advances in e-discovery and cybersecurity incident response investigations.

McCreight saw the need to develop software to assist law enforcement officers in safely searching desktop computers for criminal evidence. EnCase was developed to allow any investigator to easily, rapidly and securely search digital media and build a court case. At that time, Windows 95 was the standard, Apple Computer was on the decline, and the Internet was just emerging. There were no smartphones, but the PalmPilot personal digital assistant was becoming popular.

EnCase provided officers with a much more efficient means of gathering data than manually searching each file on the computer.

"I had a feeling, even in those early days, that EnCase was making a real difference to law enforcement investigators," said McCreight. "From the beginning, I felt that we were all working for something much larger than ourselves, and that is what keeps me motivated to this day."

In its 15-year history, Guidance Software has grown to more than 500 employees with offices around the world and is a publicly traded corporation. The company offers five major EnCase product lines, professional services, training and certification and recently acquired Tableau and CaseCentral. EnCase is used by more than 65 of Fortune 100 companies and there are more than 40,000 active licenses worldwide. The software has been mentioned in more than 100 court opinions, including such high-profile cases as the case against shoe bomber Richard Reid, the murder trial against Scott Peterson in California, and the identification of Dennis Rader, the serial killer known as the "BTK killer" in Kansas.

As Guidance Software grew and EnCase came to be used in computer investigations, the company recognized a need for a training and certification programs. Guidance Software debuted the EnCase Certified Examiner (EnCE) program in 2001 and has since certified more than 3,000 digital forensic practitioners. Its Guidance Software training program has hosted more than 50,000 students in its classroom, online training or certified partner training programs.

Guidance Software celebrates its 15th anniversary this month and will culminate the celebration at its annual Computer and Enterprise Investigations Conference (CEIC) in Orlando, Fla., on May 19-22, 2013. For more information, please visit http://www.ceicconference.com.

Source: Guidance Software, Inc.