An Introduction to Digital Forensics: Types and Techniques

The expansion of technology has resulted in a flood of people with the skills and expertise to breach an organization's cybersecurity defenses. Companies look to ethical hackers and cybersecurity specialists to prevent and defend against cyber threats.

According to a recent survey, the number of cybersecurity breaches grew by 11% between 2017 and 2018. According to the Economic Impact of Cybercrime research, the cost of such breaches is astronomical, approximately $600 billion globally.

As a result, businesses and government agencies are becoming more adept at battling cyber criminals, tracking them down, and bringing them to court. They're doing it through digital forensics.

In this article on digital forensics, let's take a look at the industry, where things are, and what it takes to be successful, as shown in the tables below.

• What is digital forensics in cybersecurity?

• What is the Purpose of Digital Forensics?

• What are the main branches of digital forensics?

• Why Is Digital Forensics Important?

• What are the steps involved in a typical digital forensic investigation?

• What are some common techniques used to analyze digital evidence?

• What are the Challenges faced by Digital Forensics

• What are the Example Uses of Digital Forensics

• What are the Advantages of Digital forensics

• What are the Disadvantages of Digital Forensics

• What is the difference between cyber and digital forensics?

• How is digital forensics used in incident response?

• What are popular digital forensic tools?

• Digital Forensics Salaries and Job Descriptions

• History of Digital Forensics

What is "Digital Forensics" in Cybersecurity?

Digital forensics, also referred to as "digital forensic science", is a subfield of forensic science that focuses on locating, obtaining, processing, analyzing, and reporting on electronically stored data. The recovery and examination of data from digital devices and cybercrimes are the main goals of this branch of cybersecurity. The term "digital forensics" originally referred to the study of computer forensics, but it has since expanded to cover all devices that store digital data.

Digital forensics is becoming an increasingly significant component of both law enforcement and business as society's reliance on computer systems and the cloud increases. The identification, preservation, examination, and analysis of digital evidence in and out of a court of law using techniques that have been scientifically proven and accepted is the focus of digital forensics.

Almost all illegal activities involve electronic evidence, so digital forensics support is essential for law enforcement investigations.

Smartphones, computers, remote storage, unmanned aerial systems, shipborne equipment, and other gadgets are used to gather electronic evidence.

Digital forensics' main objective is to gather data from electronic evidence, transform it into useful information, and then present the results in court. All procedures employ reliable forensic techniques to ensure that the results are admissible in court.

Seizure, forensic imaging, and analysis of digital media are three of the five categories into which the technical portion of an investigation is currently subdivided.

What is the Purpose of Digital Forensics?

Digital forensics' main objective is to gather data from electronic evidence, transform it into useful information, and then present the results in court. To ensure that the findings are admissible in court, all processes employ sound forensic methods.

The main objectives of using computer forensics are as follows:

• In order for the investigating agency to use computers and related materials as evidence in court, it helps with the recovery, analysis, and preservation of those materials.

• It aids in determining the primary offender and the motivation for the crime.

• Establishing procedures at a crime scene to make sure that any digital evidence collected is clean.

• Data collection and duplication: retrieving and analyzing evidence from digital media by recovering deleted files and partitions.

• Enables you to quickly find evidence and calculate the victim's likely impact of malicious behavior.

• Making a computer forensic report that gives a thorough account of the investigation.

• Preserving the evidence by adhering to the chain of possession.

What are the Main Branches of Digital Forensics?

Digital forensics and computer forensics are no longer interchangeable terms. Data coming from various digital devices, including tablets, smartphones, flash drives, and even cloud computing, is becoming a growing source of concern.

Digital forensics can generally be divided into five groups:

• Computer Forensics: The examination of computers and digital storage media is known as computer forensic science (also spelled computer forensics). To locate, preserve, retrieve, evaluate, and communicate facts and opinions about the inspected data, involves analyzing digital data.

  It is used in both civil and criminal proceedings. With additional standards and practices intended to produce a legal audit trail with a clear chain of ownership, the procedures and principles are similar to those used in data recovery.

  The same rules and procedures apply to computer forensic evidence as to other digital evidence.

• Mobile Device Forensics: A branch of digital forensics called mobile device Forensics is concerned with recovering digital evidence from mobile devices using forensic techniques. It entails looking at any gadget having internal memory and communication capabilities, such as mobile phones, PDAs, tablets, and GPS devices.

• Network Forensics: A subset of digital forensics called network forensics focuses on tracking and examining computer network traffic in order to gather data, acquire evidence, or find intrusions.

  Network activity is observed, noted, and analyzed in the field of network forensics. Data on the network is extremely volatile, and dynamic, and once it is transmitted, it is permanently lost. Network forensics is therefore frequently a proactive investigative technique. Network forensics is generally used for two purposes: observing unusual network activity and spotting intruders. Law enforcement may examine captured network traffic as part of criminal investigations.

• Forensic Data Analysis: In the context of financial crime, forensic data analysis (FDA) examines structured data contained in application systems and databases. The FDA's goal is to detect and analyze trends in fraudulent activity. This differs from unstructured data obtained from communication, workplace programs, and mobile devices. Because unstructured data lacks an overarching framework, the analysis must rely on keywords or mapping patterns. Unstructured data is typically analyzed by computer forensics or mobile device forensics professionals.

• Database Forensics: Database forensics is a subset of digital forensics that focuses on databases and their associated metadata. Cached data exist in a server's RAM, necessitating live analysis tools.

  Database forensics is analyzing database access and reporting changes to the data. Database forensics is used for a variety of objectives. Database forensics, for example, is used to identify database transactions that indicate fraud. Conversely, your database forensics investigation could concentrate on timestamps linked with a row's update time in your relational database. The purpose of this investigation is to audit and test the database for correctness, as well as to validate the actions of a certain database user.

Why is Digital Forensics Important?

Digital forensics is assumed to be limited to digital and computational contexts. But, it has a considerably wider impact on society. Because computers and electronic devices are now employed in almost every part of life, digital evidence has become crucial in the resolution of many types of crimes and legal concerns, both in the digital and physical worlds.

All linked devices generate massive amounts of data. Many gadgets log all user actions as well as autonomous operations conducted by the device, such as network connections and data transfers. This includes automobiles, cell phones, routers, personal computers, traffic lights, and a variety of other private and public-sector gadgets.

Digital forensics is utilized to gather digital evidence from mobile phones, cars, or other devices in the proximity of violent crimes such as burglary, assault, and murder. Digital evidence is used as evidence in investigations and legal actions for the following purposes:

• Data theft and network breaches: Digital forensics is used to determine how a breach occurred and who was responsible.

• Internet fraud and identity theft: Digital forensics is used to assess the impact of a breach on businesses and their customers.

• White collar crimes: Digital forensics is used to gather evidence that can aid in the identification and prosecution of crimes such as corporate fraud, embezzlement, and extortion.

There is a lot that digital forensics can perform for all of these offenses, including:

• Determining the cause and potential intent of a cyberattack

• Protecting digital evidence from the attack before it becomes obsolete

• Improving security hygiene, tracking hacker movements, and locating hacker tools

• Looking for data access/extraction

• Determining the duration of unauthorized network access

• Logins are geolocated and mapped.

All of them are useful not just in coping with an attack but also in dealing with the aftermath and ramifications of one. If your firm has just been the victim of a cyberattack, you may be unsure of what steps to take next. A digital forensics study helps you figure out what information was compromised. Companies that have experienced a cyberattack must comprehend the attack in its entirety in order to determine what data was compromised.

What are the Steps of a Digital Forensic Investigation?

There are several forensic techniques that outline how forensic examiners should obtain, process, evaluate, and extract data. Digital forensics investigations are often divided into four stages:

1. Seizure: The digital media is confiscated prior to examination. In criminal circumstances, this will be done by law enforcement to maintain the chain of custody. It is vital to avoid data loss or damage during the seizure. Data loss can be avoided by replicating storage media or generating images of the original.

2. Acquisition: After the assets have been seized, a hard drive duplicator or software imaging tool is used to create a forensic replica of the data. The original drive is then returned to secure storage to avoid tampering. The captured image is validated using SHA-1 or MD5 hash algorithms and will be validated repeatedly during the study to ensure the evidence remains in its original state.

3. Analysis: Documents are assessed to find evidence that either supports or refutes a hypothesis after evidence has been gathered. The forensic analyst typically recovers evidentiary material in a variety of ways (and tools), frequently beginning with the recovery of lost data. Email, chat logs, photos, internet history, and papers are examples of data that may be evaluated. Data can be recovered from available disk space, deleted disk space, or the operating system cache.

The following are the important questions that examiners must answer for all relevant data items:

• Who generated the data?
• Who altered the data?
• When do these operations occur?
• How was the data created?

In addition to providing the aforementioned facts, examiners decide how the information relates to the case.

4. Reporting: Once the investigation is complete, the material is compiled into a report that non-technical folks may understand. It could contain audit data or other meta-documentation. These reports are critical since they aid in the communication of information to all stakeholders.

What are Techniques Used to Analyze Digital Evidence?

Digital forensics includes making copies of a compromised device and then examining the data with various techniques and tools. Digital forensics techniques aid in the search for copies of encrypted, damaged, or deleted items in unallocated disk space and hidden folders. These are some examples of common digital evidence analysis techniques:

• Steganography in reverse: Steganography is a technique used by cybercriminals to conceal data within digital files, messages, or data streams. Analyzing the data hashes contained in a certain file is what reverse steganography is all about. Hidden information may not appear odd when analyzed in a digital file or image. Hidden information, on the other hand, alters the underlying hash or string of data that represents the image.

• Forensic Stochastics: Stochastic forensics aids in the analysis and reconstruction of digital activity that does not produce digital artifacts. A digital artifact is an unexpected change in data caused by digital operations. Text files, for example, are digital artifacts that can contain evidence of a digital crime, such as data theft that alters file properties. Stochastic forensics aids in the investigation of data breaches caused by insider threats, which may not leave behind digital evidence.

• Cross-drive Evaluation: Cross-drive analysis, also known as anomaly detection, aids in the discovery of commonalities in order to provide context for the study. These parallels serve as baselines for detecting suspicious events. Correlating and cross-referencing information across numerous computer disks in order to discover, evaluate, and preserve any material pertinent to the investigation is typical.

• Live Evaluation: While the device or computer is running, the operating system performs a live analysis. It entails the use of system tools to locate, evaluate, and extract volatile data, which is often stored in RAM or cache. To effectively maintain the chain of evidence, live analysis often necessitates maintaining the inspected computer in a forensic lab.

• Retrieval of Deleted Files: Deleted file recovery is a technique for recovering deleted files. It is known as "data carving" or "file carving". It entails examining a computer system and memory for fragments of files that were partially destroyed in one spot while leaving traces in another.

What are the Challenges Faced by Digital Forensics?

For successful digital forensics, the following issues must be resolved:

• High volume and speed: Acquiring, storing, and processing massive amounts of data for forensic reasons has been a source of contention for at least a decade, and the availability and broad sale of digital information has aggravated the situation.

• Vast knowledge requirement: To properly use digital and electronic evidence against accused persons, lawyers must have a substantial understanding of and competence in digital forensics and its complexities.

• Complexity explosion: Evidence is no longer confined to a single host but is dispersed across multiple physical or virtual locations, such as online social networks, cloud resources, and personal network-attached storage units.As a result, additional skill, equipment, and time are required to reconstruct evidence entirely and correctly. Partly automating some tasks has been heavily criticized by the digital investigation community since it has the potential to quickly degrade the investigation's quality.

• Demonstration of the reliability of the evidence: The court accepts electronic and digital evidence supplied by prosecuting agencies if it was recovered and obtained in an ethical and legal manner by forensics professionals.

• Establishment of standards: Investigations of cutting-edge cybercrimes may necessitate joint data processing or the use of outsourced storage and computation. As a result, the establishment of appropriate standard formats and abstractions will be a critical step for the digital forensics community.

• Compelling proof: All digital evidence supplied by the prosecution is tangible, true, and substantial because it's incredibly simple to fake digital evidence or tampers with it.

• Investigations to protect individuals' privacy: People nowadays transfer many parts of their lives into cyberspace, particularly through online social networks or social media sites. Sadly, gathering information to reconstruct and locate an attack can infringe on users' privacy and is tied to additional issues when cloud computing is involved.

• High cost: Although digital forensics is an effective method of obtaining and storing evidence, it is expensive to store and gather electronic and digital evidence.

• Legitimacy: Contemporary infrastructures are getting increasingly complicated and virtualized, frequently shifting complexity at the border (as in fog computing) or delegating some responsibilities to third parties (such as in platform-as-a-service frameworks)

• Standardized procedures: Standardized procedures must be followed and maintained. The court may ignore the evidence if the forensics department collects evidence in the courtroom in an unethical manner and not in accordance with regular practice.

• Antiforensics approaches: Antiforensics approaches are becoming more popular. Protective methods include encryption, obfuscation, and cloaking techniques, as well as information concealment. Regardless of international cooperation, researching cybercrime and collecting evidence is critical in creating strong cases for law enforcement. To do so, security experts require the best tools for investigation.

What are the Example Uses of Digital Forensics?

Digital forensics is utilized within a company to discover and investigate cybersecurity and physical security incidents. Digital evidence is most typically utilized in the incident response process to detect a breach, identify the root cause and threat actors, remove the threat, and deliver proof to legal teams and law enforcement authorities.

In both criminal and civil investigations, digital forensics is applied.

It is traditionally connected with criminal law, where evidence is gathered to support or refute a proposition before a court. Collected evidence is utilized to obtain intelligence or to discover, identify, or prevent additional crimes. As a result, the data collected is held to a less stringent standard than in traditional forensics.

Digital forensic teams assist with electronic discovery in civil proceedings (eDiscovery). An unauthorized network intrusion is a common scenario. A forensics examiner will try to understand the type and extent of the assault as well as pinpoint the offender.

Furthermore, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Homeland Security, the FBI, Target Corporation, the military, local and state law enforcement, and practically every bank use digital forensics in cybersecurity to protect internet users.

In a few words, commercial entities have recently used digital forensics in the following types of cases:

• Theft of Intellectual Property

• Spionage in the industrial sector

• Employment disagreements

• Fraud examinations

• Improper Internet and email use in the workplace

• Forgery-related issues

• Bankruptcy proceedings

• Problems pertaining to regulatory compliance

What are the Advantages of Digital Forensics?

Digital forensics provides numerous advantages in the detection of criminals and in a variety of other forensic difficulties. Here are the advantages of digital forensics:

• It Prevents Crime: Law enforcement agencies that use digital forensics to recover digital evidence use their findings and statistics to educate the public about the dangers and pitfalls of falling victim to hackers and misuse.

• It protects and safeguards the system's integrity: To defend and safeguard computer systems and networks from hackers, cybercriminals, and other hostile elements, digital forensics teams employ sophisticated and effective procedures.

• It is more effective than relying on memory: Employing digital forensics techniques to retrieve files is always preferable to depending simply on memory. Retrieving emails or conversations from years ago, for example, can demonstrate the intent and implication of particular people involved. Digital forensics recovers whole or partial files, such as a previously visited but no longer accessible webpage.

• It assembles strong evidence: Digital forensics teams follow defined protocols and steps to verify that the evidence acquired is reliable and capable of being used to convict criminals in a court of law.

• It Preserves Data: A forensic image is obtained from a physical device while employing digital forensics (e.g., phone, laptop, etc.). This image is an exact bit-for-bit copy of the retrieved device's contents, and it cannot be edited in any way. Forensic analysts can study the image without fear of corrupting the data or modifying the timestamps. In brief, no alterations will be made to the image, and hence the data will be kept.

• It can help with data recovery: If attackers and cybercriminals have hacked a company's or organization's systems or networks, forensics can be used to effectively and swiftly recover sensitive and secret data.

• It provides court admissibility: Forensic photos are admissible as digital evidence in a court of law because they preserve the data, no one can edit the files, and they are a bit-by-bit exact copy of the extracted data from the physical device. The digital forensics approach is a scientific process based on computer science that produces consistent, reproducible results every time.As a result, it is a dependable and consistent method of producing digital evidence.

• It helps facilitate investigations: The forensics department assists investigative agencies in apprehending criminals or suspects by supplying them with legally solid, fact-based evidence that may be used to convict perpetrators in a trial.

• It offers Improved Data Analysis: Files, directories, and system artifacts can be thoroughly inspected. Metadata analysis can lead to discoveries and conclusions, such as looking at file timestamps (e.g., data modified/created), document authors, location based on a phone photo, and so on.

File associations can be rapidly discovered, for example, by tracking a PDF document found in the Downloads folder that was downloaded through the web browser after the user visited a specific website.

System files, such as those from the operating system, can be utilized to establish when the machine was last shut down, how many users were present, and log files displaying user activity.

What are the Disadvantages of Digital Forensics

Here are some of the drawbacks of using digital forensics:

• High Cost: Since it frequently requires a specialist, specialized equipment, and software, computer forensics can be expensive. It takes a long time to complete, which increases the expense. It can, however, be incredibly useful in catching criminals and recovering evidence that might otherwise be lost.

• Expensive Education: Digital forensics training is believed to be expensive because it is taught by existing forensic practitioners who are still employed. Most digital forensics courses travel overseas, so be prepared to cover travel and lodging expenses as well.

• Particular expertise and knowledge: Computer forensics is a process that uses specialized knowledge and abilities to gather, examine, and report on digital evidence. This method can be used to investigate crimes, locate missing people, and solve other mysteries.

• Tough to Understand: File systems (e.g., NTFS, exFAT), operating systems (e.g., Windows, macOS), system artifacts (e.g., Windows registry), and the characteristics of the software or hardware being taught will all be covered. Most of this knowledge is difficult to self-teach without attending any courses because it requires hands-on experience with these commercial technologies.

• Prolonged procedure: Computer forensics is a lengthy procedure. The gathering and analysis of data may take days or weeks. This can be a problem if you're attempting to solve a crime that has already occurred.

• The requirement for custom-built forensic computers: To capture forensic photos from devices and analyze enormous amounts of data, you'll need a powerful custom-built computer that can meet the processing demands. Technological needs may include the following:

  • Greater storage capacity for forensic images
  • Faster CPU processors for faster data acquisition and analysis
  • Additional RAM memory for data processing
  • This increased expense must be factored into the budget.

• Court order: Obtaining evidence may necessitate a court order. The forensic investigator can analyze the computer for evidence of the crime if a computer was used to commit a crime. This is useful when there is no other physical proof or eyewitness testimony. However, one downside is that obtaining the evidence may necessitate a court order. This means that there could be a delay in acquiring the evidence, giving the criminal time to delete or tamper with it. Furthermore, court orders might be difficult to get, and investigators are not always able to secure them on time.

• Processes, Documentation, and Presentation: The forensic analyst may have to testify if the goal of utilizing digital forensics is to get the digital evidence admitted in court. This implies that the other legal counsel may cross-examine you. The chain of evidence, custodians engaged, and appropriate forensic methodology are all critical in this case. The process of retrieving the evidence may be called into question, and the people involved in handling the actual device may be called upon to testify in court.

• Destroyed or manipulated evidence: The ease with which evidence can be altered or destroyed in computer forensics is one of the most serious problems. If a suspect is aware that he or she is being investigated, he or she may attempt to erase files or destroy their hard drive in order to prevent investigators from discovering any damning evidence. Even if investigators are successful in recovering lost files or damaged hard drives, there is no guarantee that the evidence has not been tampered with.

What is the Difference Between Cyber and Digital Forensics?

Cyber forensics is the process of extracting data as evidence for a crime (involving computer devices) while following proper investigation rules in order to apprehend the perpetrator by presenting the evidence in court. Computer forensics is another term for cyber forensics. The main goal of cyber forensics is to keep a trail of evidence and documentation to figure out who committed the crime in a computer environment.

Digital forensics is a branch of forensic science concerned with identifying, acquiring, processing, analyzing, and reporting electronically stored data. Digital forensics support is essential for law enforcement investigations because electronic evidence is present in almost all criminal activities.

The nuanced differences between digital forensics and cyber forensics with similar meanings can be explained as follows:

• Cyber forensics encompasses computer systems used in the commission of cybercrime. Digital forensics includes not only computers but also other digital devices used in cybercrime.

• Cyber forensics is the investigation of network internet crimes.Digital forensics can also be used in the absence of an internet connection.

• As a computer is a digital device, cyber forensics is a subset of digital forensics.

• Cyber and digital forensics work together to identify, collect, preserve, analyze, and present digital evidence.

How is Digital Forensics Used in Incident Response?

Digital forensics and incident response (DFIR) is a rapidly expanding field that necessitates quick thinking and a fresh perspective. To manage the increasing complexity of modern cybersecurity incidents, it is critical to combine digital investigative services with incident response expertise.

Digital forensics and incident response are branches of cybersecurity that deal with identifying, investigating, containing, remediating, and potentially testifying about cyber attacks, litigation, or other digital investigations.

Incident response examines computer systems by gathering and analyzing data, much like digital forensics.The investigation is important, but other steps like containment and recovery are carefully weighed against one another during an incident response because this is done specifically in the context of responding to a security incident.

A computer emergency response team (CERT) or a computer security incident response team (CSIRT) can respond to a security incident using the information and evidence provided by digital forensics.

DFIR capabilities typically include the following:

• Data from networks, applications, data stores, and endpoints on-site and in the cloud are collected, examined, and analyzed as part of a forensic collection.

• Triage and investigation entail determining whether the organization has been breached as well as the root cause, scope, timeline, and impact of the incident.

• Notification and reporting. Depending on the organization's compliance obligations, notification and reporting of breaches to compliance bodies may be required. Furthermore, depending on the severity of the incident, authorities such as the FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) in the United States may be required to be notified.

• Follow-up on incidents. Depending on the circumstances, it is necessary to talk to the attackers, update stakeholders, clients, and the media on the situation, and make adjustments to systems and procedures to address vulnerabilities.

What are Popular Digital Forensic Tools?

Digital forensics tools assist in cleaning up the damage and getting to the bottom of what happened for everything from minor network infractions to major cyberattacks and data privacy issues.

Although there are many open-source tools for disk and data capture, network analysis, and specific device forensics, more and more manufacturers are improving on what is made available to the general public. Organizations require a variety of technologies to guard against and analyze cybercrime as it grows and evolves.

We include a number of free and open-source digital forensics tools in this section, but we will concentrate on the solutions and services that stand out in this significant commercially available and supported market. Top Digital Forensics Software are as follows:

• Wireshark: Wireshark is a great open-source tool with a vibrant user community, but commercial training is available. Forensic tools for network packet analysis It enables real-time data intercept and decryption (it supports WEP, SSL, and IPsec).Its support for rich VoIP analysis makes it one of the live forensics solutions that stands out.

• The Sleuth Kit And Autopsy: Open-source digital investigative tools such as the Sleuth Kit (TSK) and Autopsy are popular, but commercial help is available. Sleuth Kit allows administrators to investigate disk images by analyzing file system data with a collection of command-line tools.TSK's graphical user interface (GUI) and digital forensics platform, Autopsy, are employed in public and private computer system investigations to enhance TSK's capabilities. It is not the most user-friendly computer forensic program available because it is a collection of command-line tools.

• SANS SIFT: SIFT Workstation is a free and open-source suite of incident response and forensic tools for doing digital forensic examinations. The SIFT Workstation provides a variety of free and open-source DFIR solutions, as well as deployment choices such as virtual machine (VM), native installation on Ubuntu, or installation on Windows via a Linux subsystem. It offers some of the best open-source incident response functionality, as well as some of the most cutting-edge approaches to digital forensics.

• Volatility: Volatile is a memory forensics framework available under the GPL license that allows you to extract information straight from the processes that are running on the computer, making it one of the greatest forensic imaging and cybersecurity forensics tools you can try for free.

  It is used by many forensics and cybersecurity experts for malware analysis and incident response. Furthermore, you may extract data from Windows crash dump files, DLLs, network ports, and the network connection itself using this cyber forensic application.

• Caine: Caine Computer-Aided Investigative Environment (or CAINE for short) is a full-fledged Linux distribution that you can utilize as part of your forensics investigation. CAINE interacts with existing security tools for Windows, Linux, and Unix systems. It comes with more than 80 open-source forensic tools to help you crack the case.

• Xplico: Xplico is a network forensics investigation program that restructures data using a packet sniffer that was developed in 2007. It specializes in reconstructing application data to identify its protocols using port-independent protocol identification (PIPI). Extraction of application data from an internet traffic collection is the main objective of Xplico, a free and open-source tool. Xplico is a robust tool for analyzing POP, SMTP, and IMAP traffic as well as extracting text from e-mail messages. It supports a variety of protocols, including IMAP, HTTP, TCP, UDP, SIP, and others. It generates output in the form of a MySQL or SQLite database.

• Paraben Corporation: In 1999, Paraben Corporation joined the cybersecurity sector, concentrating on digital forensics, risk assessment, and security solutions.In today's world of billions of devices, Paraben uses email, laptops, cellphones, and Internet of Things (IoT) devices to investigate forensic cases. Monthly pricing is available for access to training courses, which includes a software license. There is also a free version.

• Free Hex Editor Neo: One of the best database forensics tools for dealing with huge files is Free Hex Editor Neo. It's one of those forensic image applications that, like DBF by SalvationDATA, has both a premium and a free edition that you may try at your leisure.Manual data carving, data extraction, low-level file editing, and executing a thorough scan to find hidden data are among its key capabilities.

• OpenText: OpenText, headquartered in Waterloo, Ontario, was founded in 1991 and provides enterprise document management, networking, automation, discovery, security, and analytics services. Endpoint Security (endpoint detection and response, or EDR), Endpoint Investigator (DFIR), Forensic, Mobile Investigator, and Advanced Detection are all OpenText EnCase solutions. These technologies aid in the recovery of evidence from numerous device types and hard drives, the automation of evidence preparation, deep and triage analysis and the collecting and preservation of evidence. Pricing for OpenText EnCase is available upon request.

• NMAP: Network Mapper (or NMAP for short) is a network scanning and auditing tool used in cybersecurity forensics. One of its main advantages is that it supports practically every common operating system, including Windows, Linux, and Mac, as well as some less popular ones like Solaris and HP-UX.

• Forensic Oxygen Suite: Oxygen Forensic Suite is a prominent open-source mobile forensics tool that will assist you in gathering evidence from a mobile phone. It is one of the Android forensic tools that allows you to circumvent the password or lock screen gesture prompt, giving you unrestricted access to the data stored inside. This is a free alternative to SalvationDATA's flagship product, SPF Pro. Despite the fact that SPF Pro is much more feature-rich and powerful, be sure to take advantage of the risk-free free trial.

Figure 1. Digital Forensic Tools

Digital Forensics Salaries and Job Descriptions

Computer forensics Private computer forensic investigator, digital forensic science technician, information security specialist, and chief information security officer are all common job titles in this field. Compare the following digital forensics jobs:

• Personal Computer Forensic Computer Analyst or Forensic Investigator: Forensic computer analysts collect and examine digital evidence in order to build legal cases or develop cybercrime prevention strategies.

  They graduate with a bachelor's degree in either computer science or criminal justice. Extensive pre-professional or on-the-job computer training is required. Furthermore, private investigator licensure is required in some states; voluntary certification is available through a variety of organizations. Another requirement for this position is 1-5 years of experience in digital investigation.According to PayScale, the average annual salary for forensic computer analysts is around $73,900. Meanwhile, the BLS anticipates a 14% increase in forensic science jobs through 2029.

• Information Security Analyst: Security analysts create security protocols and programs for businesses. Their primary responsibilities include designing, implementing, testing, and evaluating information security plans in order to protect an organization's network and connected devices.

  A bachelor's degree in computer science or computer engineering is required for this position, but some employers prefer a master's degree in information systems. Furthermore, 1-5 years of experience with computer system security are required.In 2019, the median annual salary for information security analysts was $99,730, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. According to the BLS, job growth in this field will be 31% through 2029, much faster than the projected average for all professions.

• Technician in Digital Forensic Science or Cyber Investigator: Digital forensics investigators, also known as cyber investigators, are in charge of gathering and examining digital evidence connected to potential criminal activity. A bachelor's degree in computer science, computer engineering, or information technology is required for this position. Another training is extensive, and on-the-job training is common. The average annual salary for cyber investigators is around $63,600, according to PayScale. The BLS does not have a specific entry for this job title but keeps in mind the general 14% projected growth rate in forensic science roles.

• Information Security Director: Chief information security officers are in charge of managing all facets of an organization's or business's information security, as well as creating and carrying out strategies to thwart identity theft and fraud. PayScale estimates that chief information security officers make an average annual salary of about $162,700. The Bureau of Labor Statistics forecasts a 10% growth in the computer and information systems security field through 2029.

History of Digital Forensics

There were no laws dealing with cybercrime prior to the 1970s. Any cybercrimes committed were treated as regular crimes under current legislation.

The Florida Computer Crimes Act of 1978 established the first cybercrimes. The 1978 Florida Computer Crimes Act contains provisions prohibiting illegal data alteration or deletion. As the scope of computer crimes expanded, state laws addressing copyright, privacy, harassment, and child pornography were enacted.

Federal laws began to include computer offenses in the 1980s.Following the United States in 1986, Australia in 1989, and the United Kingdom's Computer Misuse Act in 1990, Canada was the first nation to pass legislation.

The rise of digital crime in the 1980s and 1990s compelled law enforcement agencies to form nationwide specialist sections to handle technical investigations. The FBI established a Computer Analysis and Response Team in 1984, and the British Metropolitan Police established a computer crime unit in 1985.

Cliff Stoll's pursuit of Markus Hess in 1986 was one of the earliest real demonstrations of digital forensics. Hess is best known for hacking military and industrial computer networks in the United States, Europe, and East Asia. He subsequently sold the material for $54,000 to the Soviet KGB. Stoll was not a digital forensic expert, yet he identified Hess using computer and network forensic techniques.

By 1992, the term "computer forensics" had been used in academic literature in a work by Collier and Spaul attempting to justify digital forensics as a new science. Yet, due to a lack of standardization and training, digital forensics has remained a haphazard discipline.

By the late 1990s, mobile phones had become more widely available and had progressed beyond being only communication devices. Despite this, because of the proprietary nature of gadgets, digital analysis of cell phones has lagged behind traditional computer media.

In response to the demand for standardization, numerous groups and agencies have developed guidelines for digital forensics since 2000. Standardization became more crucial when law enforcement agencies attempted to meet demand by shifting away from central units and toward regional or even local units.

The British National Hi-Tech Crime Unit, for example, was established in 2001 to provide a national infrastructure for computer crime, with employees based in central London and with the various regional police forces.

Recommended Practices for Computer Forensics was a publication of the Scientific Working Group on Digital Evidence (SWGDE) in 2002.

The Convention on Cybercrime, a European-led international convention, entered into force in 2004 with the goal of unifying national computer crime legislation, investigation methodologies, and international collaboration. The pact has been signed and ratified by 43 countries (including the United States, Canada, Japan, South Africa, the United Kingdom, and other European countries).

ISO 17025, the General standard for the competency of testing and calibration laboratories, was published in 2005 as an International standard for digital forensics.

The field of digital forensics is still plagued by problems. Despite the growing use of cellphones, UNIX, and Linux-based operating systems, a 2009 report, Digital Forensic Research: The Good, the Bad, and the Unaddressed, identified a bias toward Windows operating systems in digital forensics research.

Simson Garfinkel identified increased digital media size, pervasive encryption, a growing range of operating systems and file formats, more people owning various devices, and legal constraints as the main hazards to digital forensics investigations in 2010. The research addressed important challenges like training and the high expense of entering the field. Other critical challenges include the rise of cybercrime, cyberwarfare, and cyberterrorism.