Dr Richard Matthews is an expert in digital forensics. He holds a PhD in image forensics and a Bachelor of Engineering (Electrical and Electronic) from the University of Adelaide, Australia. Dr Matthews also holds several certificates in cybersecurity from Taltech, Estonia. He is a member of the Forensic Capability Network's (FCN) Visual Technologies Experts Group based in the United Kingdom. He has served as a member of the INTERPOL Innovation Centre's Digital Forensic Experts Group. His research interests lie at the intersection of digital forensic science (DFS) (as opposed to digital forensic incident response DFIR), systems engineering and intelligence. While his work is highly technical, he enjoys teaching soft skills as part of a suite of professional practice subjects to engineering students. He emphasises the importance of integrating emotional intelligence, psychology and adaptive leadership styles to build strong, resilient leaders.
Across his 20-year working history, he has experienced a diverse range of sectors, including military, governance, manufacturing and academia, across private and public firms. His adaptive leadership style accentuates both participative and transformational attributes. Drawing upon his experience and skills, Dr Matthews brings diverse, dissenting views together on problems that often have no well-defined solutions. This multidisciplinary approach fosters innovative ideas among his research students. Such freedom often challenges the traditional paradigms of siloed workflows within the academy.
In private practice, Dr Matthews is the Managing Director of RHEM Labs, a digital forensic consultancy. Since 2020, RHEM Labs has provided expert opinions across numerous jurisdictions, including America, Europe and Australia. Dr Matthews' expertise is often in high demand. He provides independent expert witness testimony on all matters related to his research areas, including digital evidence on the exploitation of children and families, social media sites, media provenance and digital storage. He has developed innovative tools to assist in the authentication of social media transcripts and the extraction of media files.
Dr Matthews is an award-winning public speaker. In his TEDx, "How safe is the Internet?" Dr Matthews sets a bleak look at our use of technology and how businesses must consider what they post online. He integrates his research interests in the previously disjointed interdisciplinary fields of electronic engineering, computer and forensic science to convey the message about internet safety from the perspective of risk.
In 2020, he was inducted into the Netflix Security Researcher Hall of fame. He received a bug bounty from the technology company Snap for his intelligence exploit enabling the extraction and preservation of digital media from Snapchat's Snap Map. He is a member of the Organising Committee for DFRWS APAC. He is now working on projects to address the prevalence of pseudo-science with media forensics and pattern-matching disciplines. He currently serves on the Advisory Board for Forensic Science International: Digital Investigation as an Editor and remains an active peer reviewer for IEEE Access, the Australian Institute of Criminology and the Australian Journal of Forensic Sciences. Dr Matthews has held professional memberships with the Australian Institute of Company Directors, the Institute of Electrical & Electronics Engineers, the Australian & New Zealand Forensic Science Society & the Institute of Engineers Australia.
In his spare time, he enjoys playing simulatuion games, being a father to his <undisclosed number of children>, <within his family structure> and <enjoys a good reference to pets>.