Fr

ee

Second Edition

Mobile phone forensics is the science of retrieving data

from a mobile phone under forensically sound conditions.
This book is an update to Practical Mobile Forensics,
and it delves into the concepts of mobile forensics and its
importance in today's world.
We will explore mobile forensics techniques in iOS 8 - 9.2,
Android 4.4 - 6, and Windows Phone devices. We will
demonstrate the latest open source and commercial mobile
forensics tools, enabling you to analyze and retrieve data
effectively. You will learn how to introspect and retrieve
data from the cloud, and document and prepare reports
for your investigations.

What you will learn from this book

Discover the new features in practical
mobile forensics
Understand the architecture and security
mechanisms present on the iOS and
Android platforms

pl

Set up a forensic environment

Understand the forensics of Windows devices

This book is for forensics professionals who are eager to

widen their forensics skillset to mobile forensics and acquire
data from mobile devices.

Explore various third-party application

techniques and data recovery techniques

$ 54.99 US
34.99 UK

Rohit Tamma

Who this book is written for

Recover data on the iOS and Android

platforms

C o m m u n i t y

Heather Mahalik
Satish Bommisetty

Extract data from the iOS and Android

platforms

P U B L I S H I N G

Sa
m

Identify sensitive files on the iOS and

Android platforms

By the end of this book, you will have mastered the current
operating systems and techniques so you can recover data
from mobile devices by leveraging open source solutions.

community experience distilled

Practical Mobile Forensics

Second Edition

Practical Mobile Forensics

E x p e r i e n c e

Practical Mobile Forensics

Second Edition
A hands-on guide to mastering mobile forensics for the iOS,
Android, and Windows Phone platforms

Prices do not include

local sales tax or VAT
where applicable

Visit www.PacktPub.com for books, eBooks,

code, downloads, and PacktLib.

D i s t i l l e d

Heather Mahalik
Satish Bommisetty

Rohit Tamma

In this package, you will find:

The authors biography

A preview chapter from the book, Chapter 13 'Parsing Third-Party
Application Files'
A synopsis of the books content
More information on Practical Mobile Forensics Second Edition

About the Authors

Heather Mahalik is a principal forensic scientist with Oceans Edge, Inc., where she leads
the forensic effort focusing on mobile and digital exploitation. She is a senior instructor and
author for the SANS Institute, and she is also the course leader for the FOR585 Advanced
Smartphone Forensics course. With over 13 years of experience in digital forensics, she
continues to thrive on smartphone investigations, forensic course development and
instruction, and research on application analysis and smartphone forensics.
Prior to joining Oceans Edge, Heather was the Mobile Exploitation Team Lead at Basis
Technology. When starting her career, she worked at Stroz Friedberg and for the U.S.
Department of State Computer Investigations and Forensics Lab as a contractor. Heather
earned her bachelor's degree from West Virginia University. She co-authored Practical
Mobile Forensics (First edition) and was the technical reviewer for Learning Android
Forensics. She has authored white papers and forensic course material and has taught
hundreds of courses worldwide to Law Enforcement, Military, Government, IT, eDiscovery,
and other forensic professionals focusing on mobile device and digital forensics.
My first book was dedicated to the people who afforded me the opportunity to grow into the examiner
I am today. This book is dedicated to those who push me to keep learning and allow me to share my
knowledge my students. Without you, I would not have had a reason to stay ahead of the curve,
find those odd artifacts, and learn ways to outsmart the tools. You give me motivation to keep
charging ahead. I would also like to thank metr0 for affording me opportunities to do things in my
career that stretch far outside of what the norm is in forensics. I will be forever grateful.
To my husband, thank you for being such a great dad and for picking up the slack so that I can work
as hard as I do. To Jack, always remember that your mama wants to be home with you and misses
you while she's away. Remember that my work is important and teaching others the right way to
conduct digital examinations may make your world a safer and better place. "The students" are
happy you let them borrow your mommy. I would not be where I am today or able to travel and teach
as much as I do without my amazing family and students.

Rohit Tamma is a security analyst currently working with Microsoft. With over 7 years of
experience in the field of security, his background spans consulting/analyst roles in the
areas of application security, mobile security, penetration testing, and security training. His
past experiences include working with Accenture, ADP, and TCS, driving security
programs for various client teams. Rohit has also coauthored Learning Android Forensics,
which explains various techniques to perform forensics on the Android platform. You can
contact him at [email protected] or on Twitter at @RohitTamma.
Writing this book has been a great experience as it has taught me several things, which could not
have been possible otherwise . I would like to dedicate this book to my parents for helping me in every
possible way throughout my life.

Satish Bommisetty is a security analyst working for a Fortune 500 company. His primary
areas of interest include iOS forensics, iOS application security, and web application
security. He has presented at international conferences, such as ClubHACK and C0C0n. He
is also one of the core members of the Hyderabad OWASP chapter. He has identified and
disclosed vulnerabilities within the websites of Google, Facebook, Yandex, PayPal, Yahoo!,
AT&T, and more, and is listed in their hall of fame.
I would like to thank everyone who encouraged me while producing this book.

Preface
The exponential growth of mobile devices has revolutionized many aspects of our lives. In
what is called as the post-PC era, smartphones are engulfing desktop computers with their
enhanced functionality and improved storage capacity. This rapid transformation has led to
increased usage of mobile handsets across all the sectors.
Despite their small size, smartphones are capable of performing many tasks: sending
private messages and confidential e-mails, taking photos and videos, making online
purchases, viewing our salary slips, completing banking transactions, accessing social
networking sites, managing business tasks, and more. Hence, a mobile device is now a huge
repository of sensitive data that can provide a wealth of information about its owner. This
has in turn led to the evolution of Mobile Device Forensics, a branch of digital forensics that
deals with retrieving data from a mobile device. Today, there is huge demand for
specialized forensic experts, especially given the fact that the data retrieved from a mobile
device is court admissible.
Mobile forensics is all about utilizing scientific methodologies to recover data stored within
a mobile phone for legal purposes. Unlike traditional computer forensics, mobile forensics
has limitations in obtaining evidence due to rapid changes in the technology and the fastpaced evolution of mobile software. With different operating systems and with a wide
range of models being released into the market, mobile forensics has expanded over the last
few years. Specialized forensic techniques and skills are required in order to extract data
under different conditions.
This book takes you through the challenges involved in mobile forensics and practically
explains detailed methods of collecting evidence from different mobile devices with iOS,
Android, and Windows mobile operating systems.
This book is organized in a manner that allows you to focus independently on chapters that
are specific to your required platform.

Preface

What this book covers

Chapter 1, Introduction to Mobile Forensics, introduces you to the concepts of mobile

forensics, its core values, and its limitations. This chapter also provides an overview of
practical approaches and best practices involved in performing mobile forensics.
Chapter 2, Understanding the Internals of iOS Devices, provides an overview of the popular

Apple iOS devices, including an outline of different models and their hardware.
Throughout this book, we explain iOS security features and device security and its impact
on the iOS forensics approaches. This chapter also gives an overview of the iOS file system
and outlines the sensitive files that are useful for forensic examination.
Chapter 3, iOS Forensic Tools, gives an overview of existing open source and commercial

iOS forensics tools. These tools differ in the range of mobile phones they support and the
amount of data that they can recover. This chapter describes the advantages and limitations
of those tools
Chapter 4, Data Acquisition from iOS Devices, covers various types of forensic acquisition

methods that can be performed on iOS devices and guides you through preparing your
desktop machine for forensic work. This chapter also discusses passcode bypass techniques
and physical extraction of the devices and explains different ways in which the device can
be imaged.
Chapter 5, Data Acquisition from iOS Backups, provides detailed explanations of different

types of iOS backup and details what types of file are stored in the backup. This chapter
also covers logical acquisition techniques of recovering data from the backups.

Chapter 6, iOS Data Analysis and Recovery, discusses the types of data that is stored on iOS

devices and the general location of this data storage. Common file types used in iOS devices
such as plist and SQLite are discussed in detail to provide an understanding of how the
data is being stored on the device, which will help the forensic examiners to efficiently
recover data from these files.
Chapter 7, Understanding Android, introduces you to the Android model, file system, and

its security features. It provides an explanation of how data is stored in any Android device,
which will be useful while carrying out forensic investigation.
Chapter 8, Android Forensic Setup and Pre Data Extraction Techniques, guides you through

the Android forensic setup and other techniques to follow before extracting any
information. Screen lock bypass techniques and gaining root access are also discussed in
this chapter.

Preface

Chapter 9, Android Data Extraction Techniques, provides an explanation of physical, file

system, and logical acquisition techniques for extracting relevant information from an
Android device.

Chapter 10, Android Data Analysis and Recovery, talks about extracting and analyzing data

from Anroid image files. This chapter also covers possibilities and limitations for recovering
deleted data from Android devices.
Chapter 11, Android App Analysis, Malware, and Reverse Engineering, covers the analysis of

some of the widely used Android apps to retrieve valuable data. This chapter also covers
Android malware and techniques to reverse engineer an Android app.
Chapter 12, Windows Phone Forensics, provides a basic overview of forensic approaches

when dealing with Windows Phones.

Chapter 13, Parsing Third-Party Application Files, covers forensic approaches to include

acquisition and analysis techniques when dealing with BlackBerry devices. BlackBerry
encryption and data protection is also addressed.

13

Parsing Third-Party Application

Files
Third-party applications have taken the smartphone community by storm. Most
smartphone owners have more than one app on their device that they rely on to chat, game,
get directions, or share pictures. According to http://www.statista.com/statistics/
276623/number-of-apps-available-in-leading-app-stores/, there are almost 4
million apps existing worldwide for the various smartphones. Apple App Store offers
approximately 1.5 million apps, Google Play offers 1.6 million, Amazon offers 400,000 apps,
and Windows offers 340,000. This number is expected to grow exponentially through 2017.
The goal of this chapter is to introduce you the various applications seen on Android, iOS
devices, and Windows Phones. Each application will vary due to versions and devices, but
their underlying structures are similar. We will look at how the data is stored and why
preference files are important to your investigation.
We will cover the following topics in detail in this chapter:
Different third-party applications
How applications are stored on iOS devices
How applications are stored on Android devices
Windows Phone 8 application storage
How to use both commercial and open source solutions to parse application data

Parsing Third-Party Application Files

Third-party application overview

Third-party applications are an integral part of mobile device investigations. Often, the key
artifacts seem to exist within an application. This requires the examiner to understand
where application data is stored on the device, how application data is saved for this
platform, and which tool best helps uncover the evidence. Manual parsing is often a key
factor when examining third-party applications on any smartphone. While some
commercial tools, such as Magnet IEF, are known for application parsing support, no tool is
perfect and it's virtually impossible for tools to keep up with the frequent updates that are
released for each application. Most often, you will realize that the commercial tools parse
the most popular applications on the market. For example, when Facebook purchased
WhatsApp, Cellebrite, IEF, and Oxygen Forensics started supporting this application.
Facebook is extremely popular, but data isn't always extracted or parsed, due to security
features that are built into the app. This is where all apps differ. Our best advice is to test,
test, and test! You can download an app, populate data, and examine the results to see how
your view of the evidence compares to your actual evidence. This practice will enable you
to understand how updates change the artifacts, how evidence locations have changed, and
how to manually extract artifacts that your tools are missing. Additionally, reverseengineering an app and analyzing its code will help us identify where the data is stored and
how it is stored.
Most applications do not require a data plan for use. They can fully function off a WiFi
network, which means that apps function when a person travels to a region in which their
device will not work. For example, when I travel, I rely on Skype, Viber, and WhatsApp to
call and text family and friends. All that is required is that my smartphone is connected to
WiFi.
We have already addressed some third-party application extraction and analysis tips in this
book. In addition to this, we discussed the files that need to be examined to understand and
analyze application data in Chapter 6, iOS Data Analysis and Recovery, Chapter 10,
Android Data Analysis and Recovery, Chapter 11, Android App Analysis, Malware, and Reverse
Engineering, and Chapter 12, Windows Phone Forensics. This chapter will dive deeper into
the applications and relevant files and prepare the examiner for the analysis of these
artifacts. Each application has a purpose. Most tools provide support for the most popular
application in each category. The rest is up to you. A glimpse of applications as presented
by Oxygen Detective is shown in the following screenshot. As expected, these are not all of
the applications that are present on the device; rather, these are just the ones that the tool
knows how to parse:

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Chapter 13

Example of applications parsed by Oxygen

Chat applications
Chat applications are among the most common applications on the market. These
applications provide users with the ability to chat outside the standard SMS services offered
by the network service provider and device and sometimes in a secure method. By secure,
the apps may offer encryption, private profiles, private group chats, and more.
Additionally, these apps enable the user to message others without the need for a data plan,
as WiFi provides all the access that they need. Tango, Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp,
Skype, and SnapChat are some of the more popular applications.
Parsing artifacts from chat applications is not always simple. Often, multiple tools and
methods will be required to extract all of the data. Commercial tools may only parse a
portion of the data, forcing the examiner to learn how to examine and recover all data or
miss evidence. Oxygen Detective is being used to parse chat messages from Tango on an
Android device in the following screenshot. Note that the message does not show the image
in the table. However, this image can be pieced back into the message, as shown in the
following screenshot, to provide the total picture of what was being shared in the
conversation. In this example, the graphic was located and is shown with an arrow pointing
to the message to which it belongs. This was a manual process and was not performed by
the tool:

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Parsing Third-Party Application Files

An example of piecing application chat logs back together

GPS applications
Most users branch outside their standard phone apps for GPS support. This includes getting
directions to locations and obtaining maps for areas of interest. Common GPS applications
include Waze, Google Maps, and more. Waze goes beyond just providing directions, as it
also alerts the user to road hazards, traffic, and police officers that are along the path they
are driving:

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Chapter 13

The Waze application

Other applications that store location information include Twitter, Instagram, Facebook,
FourSquare, and so on. These applications enable a user to alert friends and followers
to their location when they create a post or share an image/video. All of these transactions
are tracked within the app. Understanding this is key to uncovering additional artifacts that
are not reported by your forensic tool.
When examining location information from GPS applications, it is best to assume that you
need to manually examine the databases and preference files that are associated with that
application. We recommend using your forensic tool to triage the data on the device and
then dive deeply into the artifacts, which will be discussed later in this chapter. An example
of Waze being parsed by UFED Physical Analyzer is in the following screenshot. Here, we
can see that the user had five favorite locations, 74 mapped locations, and 70 recent
directions. All of this information must be manually verified if it pertains to the
investigation. This is due to the fact that the tool cannot determine whether the user typed
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Parsing Third-Party Application Files

the address, whether it was suggested, or whether the user even traveled to that location.
Proper skills are required by the examiner to tie a user to a specific location and this takes
more than a forensic tool.

The Waze application in UFED physical analyzer

Secure applications
Secure, self-destructing, did it ever even happen? Ignore the claims of data retention and
hunt for that data! These apps often make claims that are simply untrue. These applications
are designed with security in mind. However, updates are released so quickly, and quality
assurance checks seem to not be strong enough to catch everything. On occasion, you will
find an app with an encrypted or nonexistent database, but the file has journal, write ahead
logs, or shared memory files that contain portions of the chats that were supposed to be
encrypted. In addition to this, the user can save media files that are shared, take screenshots
of the conversations, and do much more. Often, you may uncover the images, audio, and
video files that were shared and supposed to be encrypted.
Some popular secure messaging applications include Telegram, Wickr, and Signal. Some of
these are encrypted, and nothing is recoverable. However, this all depends on the device,
the OS running on the smartphone, and the version of the app. The security level of these
apps is publicly advertised, but again take this with a grain of salt. You should always
assume that there could be a vulnerability in the app that may provide you with access
forensically. Dig for this evidence!
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Chapter 13

Information on how secure some of these apps are can be found at https:
//www.eff.org/secure-messaging-scorecard.

Financial applications
Applications that utilize financial information, such as credit card information and personal
banking, are required to be encrypted and secure. iOS devices will not acquire these apps
without an Apple ID and password. Even if you have the user's Apple ID and password,
the data extracted should still be encrypted. Some examples of financial applications
include Google Wallet, Windows Phone Wallet, PayPal, Apple Pay, and In-App Purchases.
When you examine a device, you may see that the app was installed with the associated
application metadata, but account information and transactions will not be accessible.

Social networking applications

Commercial support for social networking applications is strong as they are the most
popular apps that are downloaded from the app stores. These applications allow users to
make posts, share locations, chat publically, and privately and essentially catalog their life.
Common social networking applications include Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Often,
users will enable one app, such as Instagram, to have access to Facebook and Twitter so that
posting is seamless. Thus, when examining devices, the user may find multiple copies of the
same file or conversation due to the sharing between apps.
When examining these apps with commercial tools, it is common for chats and contacts to
be parsed. Other data is often overlooked. Again, this means the examiner must look at the
data dump to ensure that nothing is missed. As an example, we are going to take a look at
Twitter. This application stores a lot of information that may require more than one tool to
parse. Additionally, the user may have to manually examine the database files to ensure
that all artifacts have been recovered.
Let's take a look at what the tool was able to extract. As stated several times in this book,
start with what the tool is telling you is installed, and then formulate keywords and
methods to dig deep into the file system. We can see the user account information for
Twitter, as well as the file path where this data is being extracted, in the following
screenshot:

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Parsing Third-Party Application Files

Twitter as parsed by Oxygen Detective

The next logical step is to view what the tool can tell you about the application and how it
was used. Oxygen Detective provided the following information for Twitter account usage.
Note that both public Tweets and private messages (DM) are recovered:

Twitter usage by Oxygen Detective

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Chapter 13

After examining what was parsed by the tool, the database files should be examined to
ensure nothing was missed. This is not always simple, as each account and function may
have a unique database. By function, we mean that contacts may be stored in one database
while chats and account information are stored in another. Once you become more familiar
with common applications, you will know where to look first. At the time of writing this
book, the following databases were the most relevant:
Global.db: This database contains account information, such as the username
<User-id>.db: This database contains notifications, messages, contacts, and

statuses

In the following screenshot, we can see all of the databases that are associated with Twitter.
Again, start with what you know and dig deeper:

Twitter databases containing user activity

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Parsing Third-Party Application Files

Each database may contain unique data that can be parsed for additional artifacts. These
applications also contain unique user_id values, which can be used as keywords to search
for other devices with traces of communication within an investigation. For this example,
we can see user_id values, the creation date (UNIX timestamp), and the data, which is the
result of private messaging on Twitter:

Twitter private messaging artifacts

Custom queries can be written to parse Twitter databases of interest. A good example of
how to do this is shown, as follows. This query is specific to parsing Twitter contacts:
SELECT
_id AS "Index",
user_id,
username,
name,
datetime (profile_created/1000,'UNIXEPOCH','localtime') AS "Profile
Created",
description AS "Twitter Description",
web_url,
location,
followers,
friends AS "Following",
users.statuses AS "Number of Tweets",
datetime (profile_created/1000,'UNIXEPOCH','localtime'),
image_url,
datetime (updated/1000,'UNIXEPOCH','localtime') AS "Profile Updated",
datetime (friendship_time/1000,'UNIXEPOCH','localtime') AS "Became
Friends"
FROM users

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Chapter 13

Encoding versus encryption

The terms encoding and encryption are used so frequently when discussing applications
and smartphone data that they are often confused. Encoding is essentially the process of
obfuscating a message or piece of information to appear as raw code. In some cases, the
goal of encoding is to make the data unrecognizable to the computer or the user. In reality,
the primary goal of encoding is to transform the input into a different format using a
publicly available scheme. In other words, anyone can easily decode an encoded value.
Encryption, however, transforms the data using a key in order to keep it secret from others.
So, encrypted text can be reversed only if you have the key. Most applications claim that
they encrypt the data or that the data is never saved to disk. While this is true for some,
most are simply encoded. Encoding options can vary, but the most common for smartphone
data is Base64. Messaging apps often rely on Base64 encoding to make the data appear to be
hidden or safe. A common artifact of Base64 is the padding of the data with an = when
the encoded bytes are not divisible by three.
Until a little over a year ago, Oxygen Forensics and Autopsy were two of the few tools
supporting the decoding of Base64 payloads from applications derived from smartphones.
For these tools to parse the data, they must support the application containing the encoding.
Currently, MSAB, UFED Physical Analyzer, and Magnet IEF also provide Base64 decoding
support.
An example of Base64-encoded messages is shown in the following screenshot. This data is
from the Tango chat application:

Base64-encoded Tango messages

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Parsing Third-Party Application Files

Encryption is a bit more difficult as the app may not even provide access to the encrypted
data. For example, the database directory may be empty or the cells containing the
encrypted data are simply empty. Occasionally, you will have access to the encrypted blobs
within the databases, but this data cannot always be decrypted. Again, when you face
encrypted data, look elsewhere. Have you examined the journal and write ahead logs?
Have you examined the cache and media directories? Have you examined the SD card?
These are common questions you will often have to ask yourself to ensure you are not
relying on your forensic tools too much and that you are covering your bases to ensure
nothing is overlooked. As explain explained, start with what you know. We know that the
cache and database directories store user data, so this is a great place to start your manual
examination:

Data storage locations for applications

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Chapter 13

Application data storage

Almost all applications rely on SQLite for data storage. These databases can be stored
internally on the device or on the SD card for relevant phones. When SQLite is used,
temporary memory files are commonly associated to each database to make SQLite more
efficient. These files, which were previously mentioned, are write ahead logs (WAL) and
shared memory files (SHM). These files may contain data that is not present in the SQLite
database. Few tools will parse this information, but the ones that are offered by Sanderson
Forensics, will get you started. Go to http://sandersonforensics.com/forum/conten
t.php?261-Timelining-events-in-a-WAL-based-SQLite-DB. We can see several
WAL and SHM files associated with various WhatsApp database files in the following
screenshot:

An SHM and WAL example

In addition to SQLite databases, other devices rely on Plist, XML, JSON, and DAT files for
application data storage, account data storage, purchase information, and user preferences.
These files will be discussed in the Android, iOS, and Windows Phone sections.
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Parsing Third-Party Application Files

iOS applications
Apple relies on SQLite and Plists as common locations for application data storage. On
occasion, JSON files will be used for application data. Examining applications recovered
from an iOS device can be overwhelming. We suggest you start with what you know and
what your tool is telling you. Examine the Installed Applications listed by your tool of
choice. From here, go directly to the applications directory and ensure that nothing is being
overlooked. When a user deletes an app, the databases often remain, and the link to the
installed application is simply broken. Examining all areas of the iOS device will prevent
the examiner from missing data:

Installed applications on an iPhone

After examining the installed applications, search the Library and Documents directories
for relevant Plist files that may contain application artifacts. Finally, examine the Media
directory on the iPhone as well as the one associated with the app to recover additional
artifacts, such as shared photos, videos, audio files, and profile pictures. in the following
screenshot, we are examining the Media directory associated to the WhatsApp application:

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Chapter 13

Application data on an iPhone

Android applications
Android devices heavily rely on SQLite for application storage. The preference files for each
application are often in the DAT or XML files. More so than an iOS device, examining
application on an Android may be one of the most tedious tasks due to the various locations
that data may be stored in. The best place to start is with a tool that will provide a listing of
what is installed on the device. Next, go to the subdirectories off the /Root directory.
Remember, these applications may possess unique names and may be difficult to locate.
You may have to research the application to gain a better understanding of the filenames
that are associated with each of them. The following screenshot is an example of application
directories on an Android device:

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Parsing Third-Party Application Files

Application data on an Android device

Each of these application directories will contain a lot of data to examine. We recommend
starting with the Databases and Cache directories and then expanding your analysis to
other locations on the device. The next locations to examine include the Media and Cache
partitions. If the data appears to be missing or is claimed to have been deleted, do not forget
to examine the Downloads directory on the device and SD card.
Application data can exist in several locations in the Media directories. Using a tool, such as
UFED Physical Analyzer, which provides keyword-searching capabilities spanning beyond
parsed items, will really help in locating artifacts pertaining to specific applications. We are
looking at the large amount of data stored in the Media directory on an Android device in
the following screenshot. This data is unique from what is stored in the application
directory that was discussed previously. Each location needs to be thoroughly examined to
ensure nothing is missed. It is important that you take what you learned in previous
chapters to analyze Android application data:

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Chapter 13

Unique application data in the

Media directory

Windows Phone applications

Applications found on Windows Phones are no different than those found on iOS and
Android devices. SQLite is the most common format used for data storage. However, not all
devices allow for SQLite files to be stored internally on the phone. For these devices, all
application data will be found on the SD card. Some may view this as lucky because it saves
us from having to examine several locations on the device, but the SD card and the
applications themselves may be encrypted.
Where possible, it is best to remove the SD card and acquire it using a forensic tool. When
this is not possible, the next best method would be to try to acquire the SD card through the
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Parsing Third-Party Application Files

phone using a forensic tool. Again, this will often result in missed data. As a final effort, live
analysis can be completed by mounting the device and using Windows Explorer to view the
applications stored on the device and SD card, as discussed in Chapter 12, Windows Phone
Forensics.

Forensic methods used to extract third-party

application data
Almost all commercial tools will attempt to support the extraction of third-party
applications. We recommend that you test your tools thoroughly and often if you rely on
tool output for your investigative results. This is because the apps are updated so frequently
that it is nearly impossible for the tools to not miss something. You must learn the
applications, how they work, and how the devices store the data for each. We strongly
recommend that you use your tool to triage the case and then dive into the data to manually
extract anything that the tools miss. Make sure that you only include factual data in your
forensic report and not everything that the tools parses. The tools cannot decipher the
difference between device and human creation. Only a trained examiner can do this with
confidence.

Commercial tools
As you have seen in this book, there are many tools that can handle the job of smartphone
forensics. However, there are a few that really shine when it comes to parsing application
data. Magnet IEF, Oxygen Detective, Forensics Suite, and UFED Physical Analyzer are a
few that do a good job of recovering data from the application categories discussed in this
chapter. We will take a quick glance at how to leverage each of these tools to parse
application data. Keep in mind that these tools will not find every application and will not
parse all data for applications.

Oxygen Detective
Oxygen Detective can be used to examine application data. For this example, we are
assuming the acquisition is complete, and we are simply attempting to analyze the data.
Note that Oxygen is capable of acquiring and analyzing smartphones. In this example, we
acquired the device with Cellebrite UFED and analyzed it with Oxygen. To load a data
dump of a device and examine application artifacts, follow these steps:

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1. Launch Oxygen Detective.

2. Select the Import File option and choose your image. Multiple image formats are
supported for ingestion into Oxygen.
3. After parsing is complete, start examining the parsed applications:

The Oxygen Detective application view

4. Next, start examining applications of interest by clicking on the application and

examining all of the associated files.
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5. Once you select the application, you will be presented with the data that was
parsed and the full file path of where the data was extracted. Use this path to
manually verify the findings. We are looking at the Pinterest application in the
following screenshot. Note how the container, file, and table of interest
are provided and hyperlinked for the user. The tool is even encouraging you to
dig deeper and verify the findings:

Oxygen Detective Pinterest example

Oxygen Detective has built-in features for keyword searching, bookmarking, and
reporting. In addition, the SQLite Database and Plist Viewer will provide a
method to examine relevant application data.
6. Report all account information, chats, messages, locations, and any other data of
interest as this provides relevance to your investigation.

Magnet IEF
Magnet IEF has been known as one of the leaders in Internet and application parsing for
digital media. They are just as strong with mobile devices. Again, one tool cannot do the
job, but IEF proves to be the strongest and parses the most applications from Android, iOS,
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and Windows Phones. The downside to this tool is that we are forced to rely on the
reported artifacts as the file system is not normalized and provided for manual
examination. To use IEF to examine application artifacts, follow these steps:
1. Launch IEF and then select MOBILE (note that, if MOBILE is grayed out, you
need to obtain a license that provides mobile support from Magnet Forensics):

Magnet IEF

2. Select IMAGES and navigate to your image file. More than one image can be
loaded and parsed at the same time.
3. Select NEXT and determine what you want to parse. We recommend selecting
CHECK ALL:

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Magnet IEF supported artifacts

4. Browse to the location where you wish to save the case file and select Find
Evidence.
5. Once complete, the IEF Report Viewer will be displayed:

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Application Artifacts in Magnet IEF

The first step in examination is to review what is parsed by IEF. In the preceding
screenshot, we can see that Telegram was parsed. Start your examination in the most
relevant location. For example, if you are looking for Telegram chats, go right to that
location and start examining the artifacts. Note that Messages and Chats are pulled into two
different categories. This is common when Private Messaging is used. All relevant
application containers should be examined. Additionally, IEF provides the full file path
from which the data was recovered. Use another tool to navigate to this file for verification
and manual examination.
IEF also provides logical keyword search; essentially it will search what it can parse and
nothing else, bookmarking and reporting. Make sure that you only report factual
application artifacts and incorporate this into your final forensic report.

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UFED Physical Analyzer

Physical Analyzer is one of the most well-known mobile forensic tools on the market. This
tool is one of the best platforms to manually conduct an examination in addition to
leveraging the data parsed by the tool. For application analysis, Physical Analyzer is good
at parsing chats and contacts for each supported application. For data that in not parsed,
Physical Analyzer provides an analytical platform that enables the user to browse the file
system to uncover additional artifacts. Keyword searching is robust in this tool and is
capable of searching raw Hex as well as parsed data. In addition, a SQLite viewer is
included.
To conduct a forensic examination of application data in Physical Analyzer, follow these
steps to get started:
Launch Physical Analyzer by double-clicking on the UFD shortcut image file or by doubleclicking on the tool icon.
Load the image file and wait until parsing completes.
Examine the parsed artifacts, as shown in the following screenshot. For this example, we are
examining Tango. Physical Analyzer recovered Tango data in Chats, Contacts, Installed
Applications, Passwords, and User Accounts:

Tango as parsed by Physical Analyzer

We recommend examining what is parsed and referring to the hyperlink of where the data
is being extracted. Navigate to this path and then examine the entire application directory.
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To find the application directory, leverage built-in keyword searching capabilities to aid in
the investigation. Remember, you may have to conduct research to determine the file names
associated to the app if this is not apparent. Tango, for example, does not use the term
Tango in the file paths or filenames. The directory is .sgiggle and the primary database is
tc.db. This makes our job harder because we can't simply search for Tango and get
accurate results.

Open source tools

For those on a budget, it is possible to examine application data from smartphones using
open source solutions and cheap tools. These solutions are more difficult, and they are often
not the answer for those new to forensics who need the assistance of a tool to aid in data
extraction and analysis. Examining application data is tedious, and if you do not know
where to look, the chances are that you will need to spend some money to get a head start.
Tools, such as Andriller, can be purchased for around $500. This not free, but it's also not
$10,000, which is what some of the other commercial tools cost. We will cover a few of our
favorite tools that are useful in parsing application data from smartphones.

Autopsy
Autopsy is one of the best tools to examine Android and Windows Phones. Unfortunately,
iOS parsing is not provided in Autopsy. Autopsy can be downloaded from http://sleuth
kit.org/autopsy/. When using Autopsy, the Android Analyzer module will parse some
application data from the device. This module is unique in that it is currently the only tool
that parses WordsWithFriends, a gaming application, and was the first tool, other than
Oxygen Forensics, to provide Base64 decoding support for Tango chat messages. Some say
that Autopsy is the free solution for those who cannot afford Physical Analyzer.
To use Autopsy, download the software and install it on a Windows machine and follow
these instructions. Make sure that you are always using the latest version:
1. Launch Autopsy.
2. Create a new case:

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Autopsy case creation

3. Select Next and then click on Finish.

4. Navigate to your image file and select Next.
5. Select the modules that you wish to run. Keyword Search and Android Analyzer
will be the most fruitful for an Android device. These modules can also be run
after the image is ingested. The Keyword search will prove to be just as robust as
Physical Analyzer:

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Autopsy module selection

6. Autopsy provides access to file system data faster than any commercial or open
source tool available. Knowing where to go from there is the hard part. Again,
start with anything that is in the extracted content and then dive into the file
system and examine the files that we discussed in this book and relevant
application data:

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Autopsy results

Once you have identified applications of interest, start with what is parsed and then
examine the relevant database, cache, and preference files. At the time of writing, Autopsy
did not have a SQLite viewer available. All databases must be exported and examined in a
SQLite viewer. We like SQLite Forensic Browser, which has been discussed in this book.
Autopsy was able to parse Tango chat messages and contacts, similarly to Physical
Analyzer, IEF, and Oxygen. The following screenshot shows the results of the decoded
messages:

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Tango decoded by Autopsy

Other methods to extract application data

One of the easiest ways to parse application data is to create custom SQLite queries and
Python scripts to parse data of interest. We discussed several suggestions and examples of
queries and scripts throughout this book. Python is one of the best solutions because it is
free and we have full access to the libraries. One thing to keep in mind is that our scripts
have to be updated frequently to keep up with application updates. Also, make sure your
encoding schemas are correct to prevent application artifacts from being missed or not
interpreted correctly.
In addition to Python scripts, free parsers that support application extraction already exist.
WhatsApp Extract is a free tool for both Android and iOS that will extract WhatsApp
application data from devices. Often, this free tool will extract more data than the
commercial solutions, depending on the permissions the user allocated during installation.
Others, such as Mari DeGrazia (http://az4n6.blogspot.com/p/downloads.html) and
Adrian Leong (https://github.com/cheeky4n6monkey/4n6-scripts), have
developed scripts to parse applications, recover deleted data from SQLite free pages,
decode Base64, and more. We recommend using what is already available before
developing your own.

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Summary
Many apps are not what they claim to be. Never trust what you read about the apps, as
Quality Assurance testing across these apps is not consistent, and we have determined
several vulnerabilities and security flaws over the years that provide us with methods of
piecing application data back together. In addition, application updates will change the way
we need to look at the data. Understanding each smartphone and how it stores application
data is the first step in successfully examining applications on smartphones. Knowing that
updates may change data locations, encoding, and encryption, and how your tool functions,
is one of the hardest concepts for examiners to grasp. It is your job to learn the capabilities
of the application to uncover the most data from the mobile device.
Understanding how an application works is hard enough, and then we have to consider
how to extract the artifacts. As you have read in this book, there are so many ways to parse
data from smartphones. One tool is never enough and the reality is that mobile forensics
can be expensive. We hope that we have provided you with a practical guide that teaches
you to acquire and analyze artifacts that are recovered from smartphones. Take what you
learned and apply it immediately to your methods to conduct mobile forensics or use it to
make you more prepared for your next job. Remember that practice, testing, and training
will make you better at your job and help you perfect the art of mobile forensics.

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Get more information Practical Mobile Forensics Second Edition

Where to buy this book

You can buy Practical Mobile Forensics Second Edition from the
Packt Publishing website.
Alternatively, you can buy the book from Amazon, BN.com, Computer Manuals and most internet
book retailers.
Click here for ordering and shipping details.

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