Every year at the SANS DFIR Summit (held in Austin, Texas) the Forensic 4:cast Awards are held. These awards are meant to celebrate the achievements of those dedicated people in the field of digital forensics who labor tirelessly to bring us new tools and techniques that make our jobs and lives simpler and exciting.
The awards are handled as follows:
Today the nominations open. Using the linked form anyone can post their nominees in the selected categories, including two new categories, “Digital Forensic Presentation of the Year” and “Digital Forensic Course of the Year”.
The nominations will close at the end of the day March 31, 2015. At this time the nominees will be tallied and the top three nominees in each category will go through to the voting phase. At that point another form is posted and anyone can post their votes. The person/organization with the most votes wins.
The rules are pretty simple. You can post as many nominations as you want in as many categories as you desire. When the voting portion begins, you will be permitted to vote only once.
A word of advice; in the past those that have engaged people on social media, posted news bulletins, and sent out links to the nomination and voting pages typically do better than those that do not. I am ware of one organization, specifically, that has a computer in the lobby of their building for visitors to log in and post their votes and nominations. The more exposure you give yourself and the awards, the better the chance of success.
Please do not email me to complain that you or your organization didn’t win X award. This happens every year without fail and, while I’m happy to answer legitimate questions, I expect professionals to behave a little more… well… professionally. That being said, if I receive emails on this matter I will screenshot them and post them to social media. That last part may or may not have been serious.
Anyway, on with the awards. The link below will take you to the nominations page. I only ask that you nominate based on work carried out for the calendar year January 1, 2014 through December 31, 2014.
Nominations Page  - https://forensic4cast.com/forensic-4cast-awards/