Forensic

ISO 9001 is a registration of a quality management system and serves as the basis for many of the other ISO standards because of its intentional generalness.

ISO/IEC 17025 incorporates the essential elements of ISO 9001 and adds technical competency underpinnings relevant to testing and calibration laboratories. Its primary application is to improve the management and techni­cal structure of testing and calibration laboratories. ISO/IEC 17025 accreditation (as opposed to ISO 9001 registration) includes both an assessment of the Management System and an evaluation of the technical competency of the testing and/or calibration laboratories.

ISO 9001 is a registration of a quality management system and serves as the basis for many of the other ISO standards because of its intentional generalness.

ISO/IEC 17020 incorporates the essential elements of ISO 9001 and adds technical competency factors relevant to inspection bodies. Its primary application is to improve the management and techni­cal structure of inspection bodies. ISO/IEC 17020 accreditation (as opposed to ISO 9001 registration) includes both an assessment of the Management System and an evaluation of the technical competency of the Inspection Body.

INTERAS serves the forensic community through attendance and presentations at meetings and through participation on committees and commissions.

INTERAS staff maintain memberships with numerous forensic associations including the Association of Forensic Quality Assurance Managers (AFQAM), ASTM Committee E30 on Forensic Sciences, OSAC Quality Task Group and Seized Drugs Subcommittee, Scientific Working Group on Digital Evidence (SWGDE), ILAC AIC Working Group 10, NFPA Fire Investigation Units (FIU) Committee, the International Association for Identification (IAI), and the Maryland Forensic Laboratory Advisory Committee (FLAC).

INTERAS contracted assessors maintain memberships with ASTM forensic committees and forensic scientific working groups (SWGs) as well as continuing to work in their respective fields.

All INTERAS staff, assessors, and technical experts involved in the assessment and accreditation process must sign a conflict of interest and confidentiality policy to ensure that the confidentiality of our customers is maintained.

All information in relation to a customer’s application is kept in strictest confidence and may only be released under written approval by the customer. In cases where review by a broader audience is required, documents are stripped of any identification of the organization or excerpts are taken to ensure confidentiality.

All assessment documentation is housed in INTERAS’s secure, NIST-compliant database.

The organization as a whole is required to meet INTERAS R103 – General Requirements – Proficiency Testing for ISO/IEC 17025 Laboratories. R103 requires organizations to participate in external PT where available and appropriate. Individual analysts/examiners; however, are not subject to R103’s external PT requirement. Instead, INTERAS R221 and R318 each have separate monitoring requirements for personnel that reference the participation of either commercial PT, intralaboratory comparisons, OR interlaboratory comparisons annually for each discipline in which they are authorized. All authorized sub-disciplines shall be covered in a four-year period.

INTERAS does not charge fees for such activities. However, if review by a technical assessor or an on-site assessment is needed to confirm the continued compliance of your facility, you may be invoiced for the assessor’s time and travel expenses. In such cases, INTERAS would notify you in advance of any potential cost to you before moving forward.