Forensic Blogs

An aggregator for digital forensics blogs

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Windows Store and Apps Analysis – MUS2019

Windows Store and Apps (APPX) Analysis

While attending the Magnet User Summit in Nashville, I had the opportunity to sit in on fascinating talks and labs. One of my favorites was the talk about Universal Windows Apps given by our very own Professor Yogesh Khatri and Jack Farley. As somebody who knew next to nothing about UWP apps, I was both impressed and surprised by Microsoft. Let’s talk about some of the highlights!

UWP Apps Pros and Cons

Firstly, what is a UWP app? The Universal Windows Platform is Microsoft’s vision for the future of Windows apps. This vision evolved to include the HoloLens and IoT devices in the equation for one SDK and one user experience. You may not think you use these, but the Windows 10 photo viewer, calculator, and settings menu are UWP apps.

The Microsoft Store securely delivers apps. This helps to ensure the integrity and authenticity of Windows apps. The app packages are also sandboxed, have very limited access to the win32 API, and no access to the registry or computer filesystem outside of their own container folder. That’s where Microsoft surprised me—sandboxing has been a hallmark of Mac App Store apps for years, and it’s great to see this essential security feature come to Windows.

You can manage permissions for these apps and these permissions are called “capabilities”. The apps are also all neatly organized into their own folders, each with a unique directory name. And this is where I am not at all surprised by Microsoft: there are FOUR different naming schemes for these apps and each scheme is used in a different place. This is the sort of confusing and complicated design choice that I would expect of the people who brought us… well, Windows. Further, to interact outside of their folder, they need to link to another process on the system called RuntimeBroker. This seems like a sloppy implementation since there will probably be numerous different RuntimeBrokers running at any given time.

App Use and Functionality 

As for what sorts of artifacts you can find in these container folders, if there is any internet functionality in the app, there will be cookies, history, and so on. There are also folders for files that are synced across Microsoft accounts and a cache for large files that the app can recreate but would rather not.

These apps function like mobile apps in that when they are inactive, they are suspended to conserve resources. The threads are stopped but the app stays in memory (unless Windows needs the memory for something else). Memory pages are stored in C:\swapfile.sys if they need to be set aside for a while. It’s possible that these pages will be compressed.

There was a lot more to talk about, too: what’s leftover after an app is uninstalled (lots of registry stuff!), how you can get lists of installed apps, and so on. The slides and tools from the presentation can be found at https://github.com/ydkhatri/Appx-Analysis if you want to learn more.

I am grateful to have had the opportunity to attend this talk and many others at the conference. Thank you to the LCDI and Magnet Forensics for making this possible!

 

Blog written by Champlain College first year Jessica Hunsberger

Be sure to check us out on Twitter @ChampForensics, Instagram @ChampForensics, and Facebook @Champlainforensics to see other important information pertaining to our project!

The post Windows Store and Apps Analysis – MUS2019 appeared first on The Leahy Center for Digital Investigation.

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Internet of Things at Magnet User Summit 2019

INTRODUCTION

During the first week of April, I had the privilege of attending the Magnet User Summit in Nashville, Tennessee. Previously held as a separate training right before or after EnFuse in Las Vegas, the Magnet User Summit is a two day conference put on by Magnet Forensics. It features talks and hands on labs covering a wide gamut of topics within the field of digital forensics. I’m grateful for the chance to attend as the keynotes and lecture sessions were all enjoyable. I learned so much about the field of digital forensics directly from industry professionals.

INTERNET OF THINGS FORENSICS

One of the favorite sessions I attended was actually my first session, which was “Internet of Things Forensics”, presented by Jon Rajewski, the director of the LCDI. During the roughly hour long talk, Jon talked about a number of popular Internet of Things (IoT) devices, including the Amazon Echo, Facebook Portal, and the Nest suite of smart home devices. Jon went into detail about each of the devices and his findings about them as a forensic investigator.

One of the more intriguing products Jon discussed was the Facebook Portal.  Jon found that the Facebook Portal ran Android and accessed Facebook via a web portal rather than an application like on our phones. He went into detail about several IoT devices and showed the findings from the LCDI. The culmination of this work is an IoT artifact reference which they’ll release for open use. Through attending Jon’s talk, I learned a lot about the inner workings of IoT devices and their true security.

CONCLUSION

As the Magnet User Summit drew to a close, it was bit bittersweet to leave. Besides the fact that Nashville neared 75 degrees unlike Burlington, I had an incredible opportunity to learn. I gained more knowledge about digital forensics and networked with industry professionals! I am incredibly thankful to Champlain College, the LCDI, and Magnet Forensics for the opportunity to attend this year’s summit. Hopefully I’m able to attend another conference next year!

 

Blog written by Champlain College‘s Jackson Wajer.

Be sure to check us out on Twitter @ChampForensics, Instagram @ChampForensics, and Facebook @Champlainforensics to see other important information pertaining to our project!

The post Internet of Things at Magnet User Summit 2019 appeared first on The Leahy Center for Digital Investigation.

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Magnet User Summit 2019: Solving Cyber Crimes with the University of Notre Dame

Mitch Kajzer presented this talk at the Magnet User Summit. He is the director of the Cyber Crimes Unit in St. Joseph County, Indiana, and also an adjunct professor at Notre Dame. He talked about the changing nature of digital forensic investigations and how police agencies need to adapt. Technology is now involved in most crimes because each person has an average of 4.3 internet-connect devices. Typically major cases get forensic attention which prevents some digital forensics exams from happening. If they do, some have backlogs and wait times of months to years. The solution in St. Joseph County was to enlist the help of college students.

Partnering with the University of Notre Dame

Mitch talked about the partnership that the Cyber Crimes Unit has with the University of Notre Dame. They have a paid internship where students of any major train and receive background education in digital forensics and get to work in the Cyber Crimes Unit.

All students are sworn police investigators who work on the same cases officers work on. They provide analysis on digital devices, write search warrants, execute them, and even appear in court. Students are involved in 95% of the cases in the department, are primary investigators in about a third of these cases, and conduct 65% of all digital examinations. Mitch said that the students leverage AXIOM a lot for their investigations, and helps to create portable cases to show the digital analysis results to the officer/detective assigned to the case.

Since starting, St. Joseph County’s Cyber Crime Unit has gone from a turnaround of fourteen days and a backlog of thirty cases, to now having a turnaround of only four hours and no backlog at all. Students are having a direct impact on the digital investigations, and are solving cases by themselves. In addition, most of the intern workforce has been women, which is awesome for getting more women into this field. I asked Mitch at the end of the presentation whether or not there was a legal implication for all this. Does the evidence students find hold up in court? He told me there have been no implications because of the extensive training and certification all interns receive.

Conclusion

I think this model is really amazing and can clearly change the way digital investigations are done within police departments. I hope the country catches on to what incredible work is coming from the partnership between Notre Dame and St. Joseph County’s Cyber Crime Unit. I also think it would be interesting to see this model implemented in Burlington itself with Champlain students, especially those working at the Leahy Center for Digital Investigation (LCDI). The LCDI already does investigative work, but I think that if there was a partnership with the Burlington Police Department, it would help students gain real-life experience while helping out the local community.

 

Blog written by Champlain College fi-year Madi Brumbelow.

Be sure to check us out on Twitter @ChampForensics, Instagram @ChampForensics, and Facebook @Champlainforensics to see other important information pertaining to our project!

The post Magnet User Summit 2019: Solving Cyber Crimes with the University of Notre Dame appeared first on The Leahy Center for Digital Investigation.