The digital age requires digital tools. And because anything digital can get hacked, the digital tools we use need to be protected.
Protecting digital devices, however, is not easy. It’s also not a one-time process. Continuous protection means not just thwarting attacks but addressing those that succeed after thoroughly analyzing how they occurred.
That’s where digital forensics aided by various digital forensic solutions comes in. But what are they, exactly, and how can they enable mitigation and protection from even the most destructive cyber attacks?
The Basics: Digital Forensics Defined
All criminal activities, even those that occur online, leave digital traces behind. And any individual or organization that succumbs to a cyber attack needs to gather evidence if they ever want to bring the perpetrators to court. That’s where digital forensics, a branch of forensic science that focuses on identifying, acquiring, processing, analyzing, and reporting electronic data, comes in.
Digital forensics extracts data from electronic evidence, processes it into actionable intelligence, and presents the findings for prosecution. All these processes require using forensic techniques and tools—both hardware and software—to ensure the findings are admissible in court.
Now that you know what digital forensics is, let’s dive deeper into the tools you may need to conduct it.
Digital Forensic Software : Work Is Easier Done with the Right Tools
Digital forensic software refer to solutions that help cybersecurity analysts and investigators collect forensic data from digital devices, convert it into standard formats for analysis, and filter it to uncover relevant information.
While today’s digital forensic experts use a wide range of digital forensic tools, including hardware and software, both should analyze data sources without tampering with the data. Common examples include file analysis tools that extract and analyze individual files and registry tools that gather information from systems that catalog user activity in registries.
Different Software for Different Investigations
The digital forensic software that companies need to depend on what kind of investigation they need to perform. Here’s an overview.
Computer Forensic Software
Organizations need computer forensic software to analyze the data stored on computers and other digital devices. Such programs are commonly used to investigate cybercrime, data breaches, and intellectual property theft.
Network Forensic Software
Network forensics monitors and analyzes network traffic to detect and investigate security incidents. As such, it requires software to analyze network intrusions, data exfiltration, or malware infections.
Mobile Forensic Software
Mobile forensic software extract and analyze data from mobile devices like smartphones and tablets. They are crucial for criminal investigations and legal cases involving mobile data.
Database Forensic Software
Companies need database forensic software to examine databases to uncover evidence related to data breaches, unauthorized access, or data manipulation.
Cloud Forensic Software
Cloud forensics focuses on investigating data stored in cloud environments. It requires cloud forensic software to analyze cases involving cloud-based services, such as data leaks or account compromise.
Digital forensic investigators use cyber forensic software to hasten data gathering and analysis to obtain the necessary insights for cybersecurity and business processes and decision-making. They typically go through five steps—identification, extraction and preservation, analysis, documentation, and presentation.
Who Performs Digital Forensics?
Several job titles involve performing digital forensics, including computer forensic analyst, systems analyst, security consultant, information security analyst, and IT auditor. Let’s tackle them one by one.
- Computer forensic analysts: They help investigate cybercrime and other attacks. They use software to recover deleted or encrypted files, prepare digital evidence for court use, and interview the people involved in a crime to gain more insights. Sometimes, they also discuss cases with law enforcement professionals to offer technical expertise and advice about evaluating digital evidence.
- Systems analysts: They assess an organization’s technology usage and identify areas where it may improve operations. They sometimes research new hardware and software to recommend to their companies, find ways to improve technology usage, and develop training manuals for intended users. They can also access existing systems to ensure they function correctly and review data from various sources, including databases and communication systems.
- Security consultants: They determine cybersecurity threats likely to hit an organization and respond to any that occur. They test cybersecurity systems to identify weaknesses, recommend ways to enhance cybersecurity measures, and research new risks that emerge over time. They can work for a single company or serve many at once, giving them access to databases that may be valuable in criminal investigations.
- Information security analysts: They evaluate how effective an organization’s cybersecurity measures are in protecting confidential data. They identify possible network risks, investigate the sources and causes of security breaches, and install programs to protect data. Sometimes, they also research new malware and cyber attacks for criminal investigations.
- IT auditors: They analyze networking systems to identify potential weaknesses. They also observe IT usage to ensure all programs function efficiently, perform automated data processing (ADP) audits on data, and develop new infrastructure for the IT department. They also prepare internal audit reports that detail their observations for criminal investigations.
The five professionals above often use digital forensic software to perform their tasks more efficiently. However despite extensive know-how and experience performing the duties, a digital forensic investigator can still make mistakes.
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Digital protection and threat mitigation, as you learned here, is impossible without digital forensics. And like everything else these days, organizations can ease every technical process with the help of the right tools. In the case of digital forensics, that means using digital forensic software.
