BitLocker, PGP and TrueCrypt set industry standard in the area of whole-disk and partition encryption. All three tools provide strong, reliable protection, and offer a perfect implementation of strong crypto.

In the world of digital forensics, there are various ways to analyze computer systems. You might be familiar live system analysis or investigating forensic disk images, but there’s yet another method called cold system analysis. Unlike live analysis where experts deal with active user sessions, cold system analysis works differently. It’s like a middle ground between live analysis and examining saved images of a computer’s storage. But why and when would someone use cold analysis? What can you do with it, and how does it compare to the usual methods?

In the digital age, where information is a precious commodity and evidence is increasingly stored in virtual realms, the importance of preserving digital evidence has become a must in modern investigative practices. However, the criticality of proper handling is often overlooked, potentially jeopardizing access to crucial data during an investigation. In this article, we will once again highlight the importance of meticulous preservation techniques and live session analysis to prevent the loss of digital evidence.

Access to encrypted information can be gained through various methods, including live system analysis (1 and 2), using bootable forensic tools, analysis of sleep/hibernation files, and exploiting TPM vulnerabilities, with password recovery being the last option on the list. Each method has different resource requirements and should be used in order of least resource-intensive to most time-consuming, with password recovery as the last resort. Familiarize yourself with the different encryption recovery strategies and learn about data formats with weak protection or known vulnerabilities.

There are several methods for recovering the original password ranging from brute force to very complex rule-based attacks. Brute-force attacks are a last resort when all other options are exhausted. What can you reasonably expect of a brute-force attack, what is the chance of success, and how does it depend on the password and the data? Or just “how long will it take you to break it”? Let’s try to find out.

The new year is fast approaching, and of course we are curious to know what it has in store for us in the field of computer, mobile, and cloud forensics. But before 2022 is over, we invite you to take a moment to reflect on what 2022 has been like for us. More research, development and updates remained our top priority, as it has been in all previous years. We have continued with constant improvement to our solutions by launching new features and expanding product capabilities. We’ve also got a chance to attend some conferences to meet with you in person and share our expertise. So, here’s our take on the results of 2022.

Disk encryption is widely used desktop and laptop computers. Many non-ZFS Linux distributions rely on LUKS for data protection. LUKS is a classic implementation of disk encryption offering the choice of encryption algorithms, encryption modes and hash functions. LUKS2 further improves the already tough disk encryption. Learn how to deal with LUKS2 encryption in Windows and how to break in with distributed password attacks.

Elcomsoft System Recovery 8.30 introduced the ability to break Windows Hello PIN codes on TPM-less computers. This, however, was just one of the many new features added to the updated release. Other features include the ability to detect Microsoft Azure accounts and LUKS2 encryption, as well  as new filters for bootable forensic tools.

Windows 11 introduces increased account protection, passwordless sign-in and hardware-based security. What has been changed compared to Windows 10, how these changes affect forensic extraction and analysis, and to what extent can one overcome the TPM-based protection? Read along to find out!

The new year is just around the corner, and so it’s the right time to review our achievements in 2021. We’ve done plenty of researching, developing and updating, and posted a great deal of content in our blog. Let’s run through the most exciting developments of the year!