Working at Australia's High Tech Crime Centre (HTTC) allows IT security professionals to pit themselves against hard core criminals, not just naughty nerds, according to Australian Federal Police (AFP) investigator Nicholas Klein.

Klein had been working in the Internet security division of a major outsourcer when he heard about a position with the federal policing body.

"They [had] a small, fledgling team," he told ZDNet Australia. "We got talking and it was too good to resist".

Despite taking a "very big pay cut", Klein made the move in August last year.

"Money isn't everything... there are a lot of opportunities that a place like the AFP that are totally aside from the fact of how much they're paying me. It's a different world--it's a different type of profession," he said.

The only negative he could pinpoint was the money factor, and that just wasn't enough to stop him from taking the job.

"I thought of the pros and cons. On the cons side money was certainly there and that was about it," Klein said.

Now he works within "a diverse environment" on a wide range of investigations--work would never be able to do in the private sector.

"It's a very eclectic team, a mixed bag... In the work that we do it's proving to be highly affective," he said. "High tech crime... spans pretty much every crime type".

Klein says there are two kinds of matters--"very obvious" computer crimes like computer viruses, trojans, unauthorised hacking, and then there's more traditional crime types like child abuse, fraud and now terrorism--the HTTC was instrumental in collecting evidence during the investigation of the Bali bombing.

Because computers have become an enabling technology for these crimes, people like Klein are needed to work with traditional investigators.

"We'll run through the incident and say 'here are the places you might be able to get some evidence'," he said. "In general the Internet and computers provide criminals new ways of doing old things".

Although he's not a sworn member of the AFP, Klein still goes along on the execution of search warrants and interviews suspects. The only difference is there are some powers that can only be executed by sworn members, such as the use of force.

After nearly a year on the job, he seems quite happy to have made the move.

"The culture is totally different. It's a lot of fun... I wanted a job that was very satisfying," he said.

Helping to do his bit in bringing people to justice is perhaps the most rewarding part, he says. However there's no single crime type that Klein finds most abhorrent, despite having to deal with evidence from terrorist and child pornography investigations.

Simply being able to apply his skills to fighting crime in general is the most rewarding part.

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