Consider the challenges of the forensic recovery and examination of Essay

Consider the challenges of the forensic recovery and examination of data from mobile devices - Essay Example The capability of mobile devices has increased as a result of advance in computing ability contributed by advancement of semiconductor technology used in these devices. Due to their size and portability mobile devices have become the vessels of storing, processing and transmitting information. This remarkable development of mobile technology is origin of current security challenges. The involvement of these devices in criminal activities calls for mobile device forensics and data recovery. This paper summarizes the challenges faced in forensic recovery and examination of data from mobile devices. The scope will bring into light challenges associated while carrying forensic analysis of mobile phones and elaborate various analysis techniques. It will also depict the weaknesses of mobile forensic toolkits and procedures and the crossover between phone and computer forensics 1. Introduction Mobile devices have revolutionized communications on every group in the social structure by making connection to the internet hence global information is available at touch of a button. There are slightly above 4 billion users of mobile devices users and the use of these devices in criminal activities is quite widespread and increasing rapidly. The increased usage of mobile devices particularly the mobile phones is entirely attributed to the reduced cost, the introduction of text messaging, multimedia potentialities, custom ring tones, internet connection, and games features among others. Civil and criminal investigations in the day today life and business involve digital mobile devices forensics. These devices can be connected to crime if they are: used as a communication tool in the act of crime, means of committing crime, they contain information and a data warehouse device providing evidence. Mobile devices forensics can be defined as the science of retrieval of digital evidence from mobile devices and entails methods that show how this evidence is retrieved. Mobile devices forensics is achieved through acquiring and analysing data in devices, memory cards and SIM cards. 2. Evidence items Evidence items that can be obtained by forensically examining a mobile device include the following; Name of Service Provider and Unique Id Number that are printed on back of SIM card. International Mobile Equipment Identity (IMEI) and can be retrieved by keying in some commands such as *#06#. Network operators give facility to dial some code for finding it Location Area Identity (LAI) which is stored inside SIM Integrated Circuit Card Identifier (ICCID) is Stored inside SIM and matches the number printed on SIM. International Mobile Subscriber Identity (IMSI), a unique id for every network subscriber and is stored inside SIM. Text messages data (SMS), contacts and call logs are stored on both the SIM and mobile device handset. Multimedia messages (MMS), images, sound, videos, WAP/Browser history, emails, calendar items and notes are all stored in mobile phone memory. Some mobile devices retain information of SIM cards used at earlier times. This feature is very limited in mobile devices. MSISDN (Mobile Subscriber Integrated Services Digital