COMPUTER FORENSICS  TOOLS

COMPUTER FORENSICS  TOOLS

Computer forensics involves the act of applying various investigations and analyzing techniques purposely to collect and keep or maintain the evidence which is obtained or acquired from a particular computing device in a method that can be easily presented in the court of the law. Computer forensics plays a vital role simply because they aid ion carrying out structured analysis or inquiry while manning or keeping documented flow of evidence to find out what exactly happened o befallen computing device and the person who is associated or accused of the occurrence of the fault.

Therefore there is a specific protocol or set of rules which are usually followed by computer forensic investigators to identify faults that may be present in various computing devices. Having carried out multiple studies to researches, the computer with a defect is easily identified. Therefore the methods defined are then isolated purposely to ensure that they cannot be accidentally being contaminated. This enables the investigators to be able to establish a copy of the storage media of the computing device with fault.  Having copied the original media,  and therefore sealed in innocuous or even other facilities that are safe to ensure that the press maintains its pristine condition. Investigations that are carried out after the original media has been keeping in a secure facility are usually recorded on the digital copy. There are various performances besides patented software forensic applications that are used by the detectives in examining the photograph, searching for the hidden folders besides unallocated or free disk space which had been occupied by the copies of erased, encoded or even the smashed files.

This results  in the acquisition of evidence on numeral facsimile. Therefore this substantiation is carefully renowned in a verdict report plus substantiated with the unique to aid in the planning of the permissible events that involve finding, confessions, or valid lawsuit. Computer forensics plays a vital role in the branch of computer science about the crimes which are associated with or related to the computer and the internet. Earlier, machines were only used to producer data, and therefore the goal of the computer forensic is manly to put various crimes inquiries employing the numeral facts purposely to discover out different computing devices which may be having faults besides identifying the person who is responsible for the occurrence of a particular crime. Therefore due to the increased instances fetch offenses related to the computing devices, developers established or created numerous forensic tools to aid individuals in carrying out various investigations or researches that are performed to identify the person responsible for the crime, which may definitely result in the breakdown of the computing devices.

Though there are various computer forensic which have been established or created to aid in identifying crimes which may befall the computing devices, the various tools which are selected by the police department and the investigations teams agencies mainly depends on numerous influences including inexpensive besides obtainable specialists on the team since forensic tool selected or chosen has to be managed by an expert (Dafoulas et al, 2017, October).

Various computer forensic tools have been established to aid in the minimization of the crimes related to the computing device through facilitating investigations and researches, which aid in identifying the person who is responsible for the occurrence of a particular crime. Some of these computer forensic tools include; encase, FTK, Ways, Oxygen forensic Suite, and Volatility Framework.

1. Encase

Encase is a product which has been established for the forensics, digital security as well as security investigations.  Encase is mainly used purposely to regain resistance from the various apprehended hard drives.   Therefore encase plays an essential role since it enables different specialists to easily direct or carry out a top to bottom analysis or research of the various client records.  This research aids in the collection of digital evidence, which s mainly used in the court of law.

The pricing of the various computer forensic tools varies from one device to the other. When it comes to the selection of the system software product, buyers are mainly or primarily concerned with the price or the cost of the particular system.  The cost of a specific system determines whether the buyer will buy the system or software or not since buyers usually forego the  system, which is expensive and go for the cheap method.

The pricing or the cost of the system software of a particular computer forensic tool depends on the cost incurred in the software license, the fee involved in the subscription, software training cost ( the cost incurred in training various people on how to use particular software to gather digital data purposely to identify computing devices which have been occurred by faults as well as the person responsible for the occurrence for that crime), and the cost incurred in maintaining and supporting other related services. Therefore the individuals should account for all the prices to be able to understand the system and the total cost, which may be incurred in owning the complete software or system.  Therefore Encase forensic price starts from $3, 594 per license, on a scale, which is between 1 to 10.  Encase forensic tool is rated 6.8, and this higher than the average cost of the system software (Smith et al, 2017, October).

Encase forensic tool performs or aids in carrying out various tasks in that it facilitates an individual to hurriedly pursuit, identify besides prioritizing the possible confirmation in workstations and portable phones purposely aid in determining whether there’s need of carrying out further investigations or research deliberately to detect a fault which may have occurred computing device resulting into its failure. Besides, Encase forensic tool aids in recovering confirmation from the apprehended hard drives. Encase definably allows the investigator or researcher to carry out in depth analysis or study of the various files of the users intentionally to gather evidence such as documents, pictures, and windows registry information.

Encase technology is available in quite a number of the products, currently including; Encase forensic, Encase Endpoint Investigator, Encase Endpoint Security, and Encase Portable.

1. Forensic Toolkit

This is a computer forensic tool that is used ins carrying out various researches or investigations which are established or created by Cassata. Forensic Toolkit scrutinizes hard drive by the act of searching for the distinct information of data. This computer tool is capable of finding or locating an email that has been deleted besides the act of scanning the mails purposely for the content strings. Therefore this can be used as a secret keyword reference to break any encryption. Forensic Toolkit is capable of saving images of the hard disk in distinct segments, which can then be recreated later. Forensic Toolkit aids individuals in cracking passwords, analyzing makes, and looking for specific characters in files.

Similarly, when selecting Forensic Toolkit, buyers usually consider the price or the cost of the system hence ending up acquiring or purchasing cheap software. Therefore Forensic Toolkit price commences from $2, 995 per license. On comparing Forensic Toolkit to their competitors, the software has been rated six, which is similar to the average system software cost (Sali  & Khanuja, 2018, August).

The performance of the Forensic Toolkit differs from that of the other computer forensic tools. This is because Forensic Toolkit utilizes or uses multi-core CPUs purposely to aid in parallelizing actions. The act of multitasking, which is evidenced in this computer forensic tool, results in the momentous performance boost. Following the documentation which has been offered or given by the Forensic Toolkit documentation, one can easily cut case investigation time by 400% compared to the other computer forensic tools.

Besides, the Forensic Toolkit comprises of shared case database instead of having multiple working of the data sets (Talib, 2018). Therefore the act of using a centralized database facilitates or enables the team members within specific organizations to easily collaborate more efficiently or effectively hence saving valuable or expensive resources. The costly resources are mainly conserved since the Forensic Toolkit uses a central database; thus, various copies of data sets will not be used, which may be expensive. Also, the act of the Forensic Toolkit using primary case database aids in the provision of stability, unlike the other computer forensic tools which rely on the memory, which is probed to crashing incase the amount or the capacity of the data it is intended to store  exceeds the limit.

Forensic Toolkit database enhances   for the persistence of  the data  that is even  accessible even after the  program crashes. The robust searching spared is  also  among the performance of the Forensic Toolkit which is absent in other computer forensic tools. The search times of the various investigators are reduced or minimized by the emphasis on the indexing of files upfront.  Also, the Forensic Toolkit generates a shared index file, and this indicates that there is no need for duplicating or recreating files (Talib, 2016).

Forensic Toolkit is readily available since it is used by various people from distinct geographical areas; it aids individuals in cracking passwords as well as scanning for emails. Also, the ability of the Forensic Toolkit to use multi-core CPU, which has facilitated multitasking, thus enabling various people to carry out distinct tasks at the same time. The capability of the Forensic Toolkit to use central cases database has also facilitated or enhanced the  Forensic Toolkit to be available in the market since this leads to the continuous access of the data within the database even after the program breaks downs.

iii. X-Ways

This is computer  forensic  tool  which is powerful  and it  is  widows based licensed software offering  or  providing  numerous  functionalities pertaining or concerning computer forensics. This has been linked to the work environment, which is mainly preserved for computer forensic examiners. Ways can be integrated with Win Hex and disk editor and can be purchased as a forensic license for Win Hex (Al Fahd et al., 2016).

The performance of the X-Ways forensic tool based on the windows whereby the X-Ways runs on the  Windows XP/2003/Vista/2008/7/8/8.1/2012/10*, 32 Bit/64 Bit, standard/PE/FE. As compared to the other competitors such as people using other computer forensic tools, X-Ways forensic tools are more efficient tool after a while due to its ability to run faster hence being able to detect the files which aver been deleted and search for the hits what the various competitors will lack thus. X-Ways forensic tool is usually portable as it runs off the USB on any given Windows system without the need for installation.

Prices of various products impress buyers in purchasing such items. This is simply because there is a likelihood of the buyers to forego the products which have higher rates hence purchasing the cheap products.  The prices or cost of the  X-Ways forensic tools depends on its various products. For instance, WinHex, which is  I the hexadecimal editor, and it is particularly helpful in the realm of computer forensics, data retrieval, low-level statistics dispensation a besides IT safety. This tool is useful in scrutinizing besides excision all categories of the records and recovering deleted files from corrupt systems. This product of the X-Ways has a price or cost of $70.00.

X-Ways forensic tool is available in distinct products whereby some products such as WinHex is commonly used by various individuals in processing data and recovering the data which has been lost from the corrupt file systems or even from the digital camera cards. Therefore   WinHex is available in the market since buyers usually purchase it to be used in recovering the data, which they may loose within cetin organization hence avoiding the loose of the vital data which is useful.

1. Oxygen forensic Suite

Oxygen forensic Suite is mobile forensic software, which is mainly used for the logical examination of the smartphones and cell phones. The Suite is capable of extracting the information, contacts, calendars events, and  SMS messages present in the device. In addition, the Suite has the capability of extracting various types of metadata, which is vital in any digital forensic investigations or research.

There are various ways or methods in which the  Oxygen forensic Suite performs its various tasks or functions. First and foremost, it allows creation or establishment and use of the keywords lists, which facilitate quick searching of the relevant instance pieces of evidence in a single function. This involves the act of the investigators entering various keywords or importing such keywords from the .txt file before data extraction hence being asked e to receive or acquire outcomes after the abstraction procedure has accomplished (Barrett, 2017).

The prices or cost of the Oxygen forensic Suite forensic tool varies from its various products. Therefore most of the buyers usually purchase  the products which are cheap. Therefore The Tableau Forensic Imager, which is making the products of the Oxygen Forensic Suite, costs $2, 962.00.

Oxygen forensic suite is readily available, and it is the only smartphone forensics software that allows or enhances analysis applications in such a deep and structured way.  In addition, the Oxygen forensic Suite is available today since it has been offering support to most of the mobile messengers such as Skype, Facebook, What sap, Vibe, among others.

1. Volatility Framework.

Volatility Framework is an open-source memory forensic background for the occurrence response nave malware investigation. It is usually transcribed in python and backings  Microsoft Windows and  Linux. This framework regularly inspects the memory artifacts of both 32-bit and  64-bit systems (Perumal et al., 2017).

 Volatility Framework uses various ways to carry out multiple tasks. This involves the act of the cohesive framework to analyses RAN dumps, which rages form  32-bit and 64-bit Windows, Linux, and Android systems. This implies that one is capable of reading, reading from it.

The price of the cost of the Volatility Framework also varies from the products of the Volatility Framework.  Therefore the estimated value or price of the Volatility Framework is expected to be .$399.

Volatility Framework is readily available today. This is simply because it aids individuals to quickly inspect hence being able to identify the live memory of any operating system. This usually helps or assists us to possibly detect some kinds of advanced tag malware.

Conclusively Computer forensics is crucial since they aid in carrying out a structured inquiry while keeping the documented flow of evidence to find out what exactly happened o befallen computing device and the person who is associated or accused of the occurrence of the fault.

References

Talib, M. A. (2016). Towards early software reliability prediction for computer forensic tools        (case study). SpringerPlus, 5(1), 827.

Sali, V. R., & Khanuja, H. K. (2018, August). Ram forensics: The analysis and extraction of malicious processes from a memory image using GUI based memory forensic toolkit.     In 2018 Fourth International Conference on Computing Communication Control and        Automation (ICCUBEA) (pp. 1-6). IEEE.

Talib, M. A. (2018). Testing closed source software: computer forensic tool case study. Journal of Computer Virology and Hacking Techniques, 14(2), 167-179.

Dafoulas, G. A., Neilson, D., & Hara, S. (2017, October). State of the art in computer forensic     education-a review of computer forensic programs in the UK, Europe, and the US. In 2017      International Conference on New Trends in Computing Sciences (ICTCS) (pp. 144-154).          IEEE.

Smith, C., Dietrich, G., & Choo, K. K. R. (2017, October). Identification of forensic artifacts in   VMWare virtualized computing. International Conference on Security and Privacy in            Communication Systems (pp. 85-103). Springer, Cham.

Al Fahdi, M., Clarke, N. L., Li, F., & Furnell, S. M. (2016). A suspect-oriented intelligent and      automated computer forensic analysis. Digital Investigation, 18, 65-76.

Barrett, C. (2017). Digital forensics tools and methodologies in archival repositories.

Perumal, S., Navarathnam, S., Vosse, C. D., Samsuddin, S. B., & Samy, G. N. (2017).      Comparative Studies on Mobile Forensic Evidence Extraction Open Source Software for     Android Phone. Advanced Science Letters, 23(5), 4483-4486.