Instant messaging apps have become the de-facto standard of real-time, text-based communications. The acquisition of instant messaging chats and communication histories can be extremely important for an investigation. In this article, we compare the five top instant messaging apps for iOS in the context of their forensic analysis.

The iPhone is one of the most popular smartphone devices. Thanks to its huge popularity, the iPhone gets a lot of attention from the forensic community. Multiple acquisition methods exist, allowing forensic users to obtain more or less information with more or less efforts. Some of these acquisition methods are based on undocumented exploits and public jailbreaks, while some other methods utilize published APIs to access information. In this article, we’ll compare the types and amounts of data one can extract from the same 256-GB iPhone 11 Pro Max using three different acquisition methods: advanced logical, full file system and iCloud extraction.

Every other day, Apple makes the work of forensic specialists harder. Speaking of iCloud, we partially covered this topic in Apple vs. Law Enforcement: Cloud Forensics and Apple vs Law Enforcement: Cloudy Times, but there is more to it today. The recent iOS (13.4) and macOS (10.15.4) releases brought some nasty surprises. Let’s talk about them.

We recently introduced a new acquisition method for iPhone and iPad devices. The fast, simple and safe extraction agent requires no jailbreak, and delivers the full file system image and the keychain. The latest release of Elcomsoft iOS Forensic Toolkit expanded this method to iOS 13 and filled the gaps in some versions of iOS 12 that were missing support (such as iOS 12.3 and 12.4.1). Finally, we now officially support the latest generation of iPhone devices including the iPhone 11, iPhone 11 and iPhone 11 Pro. The new compatibility matrix becomes significantly more diverse with this release, so bear with us to learn which iOS devices can be extracted without a jailbreak.

The popular unc0ver jailbreak has been updated to v4, and this is quite a big deal. The newest update advertises support for the latest A12 and A13 devices running iOS 13 through 13.3. The current version of iOS is 13.3.1. None of the older versions (including iOS 13.3) are signed, but still there are a lot of A12/A12X/A13 devices floating around. Until now, file system and keychain extraction was a big problem. The newest unc0ver jailbreak makes it possible.

Just days ago, we have reviewed the data stored in iCloud, and studied its encryption mechanisms. We also discussed the discrepancies between the data that is stored in the cloud and the data that’s provided to the law enforcement. In case you missed it, make sure to check out Apple vs. Law Enforcement: Cloud Forensics. Today, the differences are great; Apple is using point-to-point encryption to protect certain types of data. However, it has not always been that way. Apple security model changed year after year. This article reviews the timeline of Apple security changes over time.

What can possibly go wrong with that iPhone? I’ll have a look (oh, it’s locked!), then switch it off, eject the SIM card and pass it on to the expert. Well, you’ve just made three of the five most common mistakes making subsequent unlock and extraction attempts significantly more difficult. Learn about the most common mistakes and their consequences.

We have recently updated Elcomsoft iOS Forensic Toolkit, adding the ability to acquire the file system from a wide range of iOS devices. The supported devices include models ranging from the iPhone 5s through the iPhone X regardless of the iOS version; more on that in iOS Device Acquisition with checkra1n Jailbreak. In today’s update (for both Windows and macOS platforms as usual), we’ve added the ability to extract select keychain records in the BFU (Before First Unlock) mode. We have a few other changes and some tips on extracting locked and disabled devices.

We’ve just announced a major update to iOS Forensic Toolkit, now supporting the full range of devices that can be exploited with the unpatchable checkra1n jailbreak.  Why is the checkra1n jailbreak so important for the forensic community, and what new opportunities in acquiring Apple devices does it present to forensic experts? We’ll find out what types of data are available on both AFU (after first unlock) and BFU (before first unlock) devices, discuss the possibilities of acquiring locked iPhones, and provide instructions on installing the checkra1n jailbreak. (more…)

Are you excited about the new checkm8 exploit? If you haven’t heard of this major development in the world of iOS jailbreaks, I would recommend to read the Technical analysis of the checkm8 exploit aricle, as well as Developer of Checkm8 explains why iDevice jailbreak exploit is a game changer. The good news is that a jailbreak based on this exploit is already available, look at the checkra1n web site.