BLOCK II

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 UNIT I: WINDOWS FORENSICS
1.1 LEARNING OBJECTIVES
After going through this unit, you will be able to:

• Understand and appreciate the need for windows forensics.

• Understand various technical terminologies associated to forensics in windows
systems.
• Identify major components and aspects of windows which are relevant during
forensics.
• Understand basic technologies and tools used to carry out data capture from a
windows system during forensic investigation.
• Understand basic tools and technologies behind capturing registry information from
windows systems during forensic investigation.
• Understand technologies and tools behind data and file recovery in windows system
during forensic investigation.
1.2 INTRODUCTION
Computer forensics involves analysis of a computer system and identifies traces or evidences
of activities leading to a criminal activity. In a sense much of the criminal activities in current
world have more than one link to computing environments or at least has some or other
relation to computers. Most of the criminal/other investigation tends to find traces of data or
information in a computer system that can lead to conclusion or at least leads to support a
theory pertaining a criminal offence. Windows forensics involves analysing various aspects of
windows for malicious or suspicious traces of data in order to reach an evidential conclusion
of any case. Windows forensics process is to analyse gathered information from activities that
took place in a windows system. Aspects of windows like the registry, files, cookies, bins,
memory status etc. contains initial information that can be used to promise a conclusion.

1.2.1 Background and need for Window forensics

Among the major operating system in use, Microsoft window is the most widely used
operating system. The Microsoft windows versions that are currently in use are; Windows 8
and Windows 10. Microsoft Windows originated in 1985, as an operating environment
running on top of MS DOS, which was the standard operating system shipped on most of
Intel architecture PCs.

In 1995, Windows 95 was released which only used MS-DOS as a bootstrap. For backwards
compatibility, Win9x could run real-mode MS-DOS and 16
bits Windows3.x drivers. Windows ME, released in 2000, was the last version in the Win9x
family. Later versions have all been based on the Windows NT kernel. Server editions of
Windows are widely used. In recent years, Microsoft has expended significant capital in an
effort to promote the use of Windows as a server operating system. However, Windows' usage
on servers is not as widespread as on personal computers

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To know about windows artefacts is quite important for digital forensics examiners, almost 90
percent of traffic in networks comes from computers using Windows as their operating system
and the investigators will be most likely to encounter Windows and have to collect evidence
from it in most of the cybercrime cases. Below, we will discuss several places from which
evidence may be gathered and ways to collect information from Windows.

This chapter focuses on Windows forensics. It starts by covering the different types of volatile
and non-volatile information an investigator can collect from a Windows system. It then goes
into detail about collecting and analysing data in memory, the registry, and files.

1.2.2 Major forensic areas in windows

More generally an investigator likes to access and analyse following areas in windows:

a) Volatile information like, system time, logged users, open files, network information
and drives that are mapped shared folders etc. These and many more aspects will be
discovered in the next section under the windows volatile information head.
b) Non-volatile information like file systems, registry settings, logs, devices, slack space,
swap file, indexes, partitions etc. these and many more will be discovered in coming
section under the heading non-volatile information.
c) Windows memory like memory dumps and analysing dumps and other aspects.
d) Caches, cookies and history analysis.
e) Other aspects like recycle bins, documents, short cut files, graphics file, executable
files etc.
[Link] Volatile information
Volatile Information can disappear or be easily modified. It retains its contents while powered
on but when the power is interrupted the stored data is immediately lost. Following are few
methods/tools to acquire some volatile information in a Windows system.

To get history of commands used on the computer we can use Doskey. Doskey is a utility for
DOS and Microsoft Windows that adds command history (see figure 2.1).

Figure 1: Doskey utility in Windows command prompt.

To get the current uptime and system events and statistics of the local or remote system we
can use a utility called [Link]. See Figure 2.

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 Figure 2: [Link] output giving uptimes for the windows system.

During an investigation we will always need to know who all were logged on to the system.
Logging to a system can be remotely or locally. Information like these can add logical view to
a context or a situation. The logs can be related to an event occurrence. Many tools are
available like PsLoggedon, Netsessions, logonsessions etc. to learn the instantaneous
information of the users. These tools can be downloaded from the windows sysinternals site.
Ps tools in sysinternals are handy in many ways as such. See figure 3,4,5.

Figure 3: PsLoggedon output.

Figure 4:LoggedonSessions output.

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 Figure 5:Net Sessions output.

Similarly we can also get which files were open at the time of logged users. This is also
important many times as to co-relate whether which users were probably using which files of
the system. Tools that can be used to access information pertaining opened files are: Netfile,
PsFile, open files etc. Figure 6 gives a taste of how these tools can give out information of
files that we open in the system.

Figure 6: openfiles output.

Tools like NetStat gives access to information partitioning current network connections to the
host computer. This information will be lost over time and very difficult to trace as time
passes by. Figure 7 gives an output of the NetStat command. Also, an investigator needs to
discover what processes are running on the system. This system which can keep clues to a
major crime in form of files or processes that are still on the acquired system is potentially
used just before a crime. Information about processes like executable file path, commands to
launch the process, time stamps, current modules etc. along with contexts needs to be
collected. Tools like Tlist, Tasklist, Pslist, ListDlls etc. helps us to get all these information.
Windows task manager does give some information but most of the time it does not show
vital information, hence using above tools play significant role in forensics.

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 Figure 7: NetStat output.

Information about the status of the network interface cards (NIC) connected to a system can
be very important. Wireless interfaces are very prominent these days and physical connection
does not have too much presence. Hence, it’s important to know the status of all interface
devices (Network) is important. Tools like ipConfig, promiscDetect, promgry helps in getting
the vital information (see Figure 8, Figure 9, Figure 10). Clipboards of windows are another
aspect which is of utmost importance to the investigators. Clipboards contain latest copied
area of memory which can be for later use. Clipboards facilitate users to move data in some
way between documents or applications. The fact that recently copied and pasted items do
remain on clipboard can give clue to vital evidences or circumstances leading to a crime. pclip
is a command-line utility which helps the investigators to retrieve contents of a clipboard.

Figure 8: one of the output of ipConfig command.

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 Figure 9:Promiscdetect command.

Figure 10:Promqry Command output.

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 Figure 11: various options with promqry.

Several other information like; mapped drives, shares or stored folders etc. also needs to be
collected for future tests and analysis. Mapped drives to a system are those which the user has
created. These information are volatile but can be correlated to network connections or drive
activities leading to a crime. A system resources can be shared in many different ways like
shared folders, shared network access etc. This information can be retrieved in many ways
like scanning the registry for shares. Also, command like ‘share’ can be used for the same.

[Link] Non Volatile information

Non-volatile information remains on a secondary storage device and persists even after power
is off. This information can be collected later on after all perishable information (volatile) can
be collected after the seizure of the system. Investigators can collect these information after
procuring the device and doing all the formalities of the seizure/procuring/capturing the
device under law so that the discoveries later on does not get laid down during hearing. Using
command line ‘dir /o: d’ the examiner can list out the recent updates that is listed by the
command.

Registry information

Registry information can have a good impact on the forensic analysis and investigation. Tools
like reg (see figure12,13) and regedit (see figure 14) helps in to get registry entries via
important keys. Few important keys important keys present in registries are runMRU, startup
objects, last accessed key, addresses in internet explorer, last saved directory in internet
explorer.

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 Figure 12:Options in reg tool.

Figure 13: example output of reg.

Figure 14:regedit command in windows.

RunMRU stores information about recently typed commands from run window, startup
objects are those objects or apps that start automatically on startup in windows.

Key for RunMRU is:

Computer\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer
\RunMRU

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Key for startup object is:
Computer\HKCU\<SID>\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
Computer\HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
To access the least accessed key in registry use key:
Computer\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Applets\
Regedit
To get last typed urls in internet explorer use key:
Computer\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\TypedUrls
To get last saved directory in IE use key:
Computer\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer Download
Directory
To get security ids Microsoft use:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\WindowsNT\CurrentVersion\ProfileLi
st key
Another area of registry which has valuable information for forensics analysis is the protected
storage area. These storages are encrypted. However, we can get access to these areas using
tools like Access Data tool kit (see figure 15).

Figure 15:AccessData tool window.

Some time it may be very important to get record what are all the devices that were connected
to a system. To gain access to this information we can use tools like (windows device
console) DevCon of Microsoft. Device manager of windows is also available for some Figure
16 shows the output of DevCon.

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 Figure 16: Devcon output.

1.3 RECOVERING DELETED FILES AND PARTITIONS

1.3.1 Anatomy of a disc drive
A hard disk drive (HDD), hard disk, hard drive or fixed disk is a data storage device used for
storing and retrieving digital information using one or more rigid ("hard") rapidly rotating
disks (platters) coated with magnetic material. The platters are paired with magnetic
heads arranged on a moving actuator arm, which read and write data to the platter surfaces.
Data is accessed in a random-access manner, meaning that individual blocks of data can be
stored or retrieved in any order rather than sequentially. HDDs retain stored data even when
powered off. The primary characteristics of an HDD are its capacity and performance.
Capacity is specified in unit prefixes corresponding to powers of 1000: a 1-terabyte (TB)
drive has a capacity of 1,000 gigabytes (GB; where 1 gigabyte = 1 billion bytes). Typically,
some of an HDD's capacity is unavailable to the user because it is used by the file system and
the computer operating system, and possibly inbuilt redundancy for error correction and
recovery.

An HDD records data by magnetizing a thin film of ferromagnetic material on a disk.

Sequential changes in the direction of magnetization represent binary data bits. The data is
read from the disk by detecting the transitions in magnetization. User data is encoded using an
encoding scheme, such as run-length limited encoding, which determines how the data is
represented by the magnetic transitions.

In computer disk storage, a sector is a subdivision of a track on a magnetic disk or optical

disc. Each sector stores a fixed amount of user-accessible data, traditionally
512 bytes for hard disk drives (HDDs) and 2048 bytes for CD-ROMs and DVD-ROMs.
Newer HDDs use 4096-byte (4 KB) sectors, which are known as the Advanced Format (AF).

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 Figure 17: Hard Disk parts

Geometrically, the word sector means a portion of a disk between a center, two radii and a
corresponding arc (see Figure 17, item B), which is shaped like a slice of a pie. Thus, the disk
sector (Figure 17, item C) refers to the intersection of a track and geometrical sector.

In disk drives, each physical sector is made up of three basic parts, the sector header, the data
area and the error-correcting code (ECC). The sector header contains information used by the
drive and controller; this information includes sync bytes, address identification, flaw flag
and header parity bytes. The header may also include an alternate address to be used if the
data area is undependable. The address identification is used to ensure that the mechanics of
the drive have positioned the read/write head over the correct location. The data area contains
the recorded user data, while the ECC field contains codes based on the data field, which are
used to check and possibly correct errors that may have been introduced into the data.

Figure 18: disk layout

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1.3.2 Data organization in Windows
Windows organisation data using following structures or elements:

Cluster: Group of sectors form a cluster. Typically clusters can be of 32 kB. Clusters use
logical representation of sectors.

Partition: Logical division of the physical storage. A large physical storage needs to be
partitioned in smaller size so that the OS can use each partition as separate entity. However,
smart user hides data into hidden or temporarily deleted partitions.

Master Boot Record (MBR): Every OS starts with reading a boot record or programme at the
first location of a partition that is mapped to the OS hardware but up sequence.

FAT32: Initially FAT was the widely used allocation systems. FAT stands for file allocation
table and it’s a structure that keeps vital Meta data of a file that resides on the hard disc or any
other storage. The FAT system uses a certain defines mechanisms to construct/store a file.
These pre-defined mechanisms are used very nicely by forensics tools to reconstruct file by
forensic tools.

New Technology File System (NTFS): The NTFS is a latest standard version introduced by
Microsoft which is little advanced in terms of the allocation table structure as well as keeps
the data compatible foe other OS to work upon. NTFS is currently used with Window OS. A
file in NTFS is deleted in two steps.

a. The file moved to recycle bin and the meta-data is updated. These meta-data can be
read by the forensic tools.
b. The clusters occupied (originally) by the file are then marked available for new file
and the master file table is also updated. When the user empties the recycle bin the
NTFS marks the clusters as available and considers the files to be permanently
deleted.
1.3.3 Retrieving deleted files
When a file is deleted, the file system removes the file logically. That is, it removes all the
meta-data and stamps related to the file. However, the file still resides in the disk as a physical
entity until it is overwritten. These physical areas can be very easily explored and read and
converted to a readable file using forensic application. It is observed that data resides on a
computer for a very long time and are retrieved to a good extent.

1.3.4 Retrieving cached files

One can find the webpage visited by the suspect or the victim by looking into the cache. The
cache file of an application can be spread across in the system storage. We can confine only
search by using typical keywords elated to the case or probable websites.

1.3.5 Retrieving files in unallocated space

In general a deleted file can be searched sequentially or structurally by looking for file
headers or extensions. However, certain tools help us to scan and look for broken headers and
use supplementary headers to retrieve data or at least retrieve blocks of a lost file for

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unallocated space. These retrieved blocks can later be studied and reformed using other tools
to retrieve lost files to a great extent. This is also called as file carving.

Meta data of the files can be found from the applications used to create the files however there
can be certain tools available to view the metadata of a files like Meta Viewer, Metadata
Analysis, iscrub etc.

1.4 MORE ABOUT RECOVERING LOST FILES/DATA

1.4.1 Slack space, swap file, deleted files
Even these days most of the users aren’t careful and thus the forensic experts get more clues
because of this. The user’s ignorance of how computers manage memory, disks and related
stuff leaves lots of spaces which are rather invisible to the user (who can be a subject of an
investigation). Let us look at three potential locations where an investigator explores to find
lost data as deleted files and slack space, swap space etc.

[Link] Slack Space

Slack Space is the unused space in a disk cluster. The DOS and Windows file systems use
fixed-size clusters. Even if the actual data being stored requires less storage than the cluster
size, an entire cluster is reserved for the file. The unused space is called the slack space.

DOS and older Windows systems use a 16-bit file allocation table (FAT), which results in
very large cluster sizes for large partitions. For example, if the partition size is 2 GB, each
cluster will be 32 K. Even if a file requires only 4 K, the entire 32 K will be allocated,
resulting in 28 K of slack space. In computer forensics, slack space is examined because it
may contain meaningful data.

[Link] Swap space

Swap space is the area on a hard disk which is part of the Virtual Memory of your machine,
which is a combination of accessible physical memory (RAM) and the swap space. Swap
space temporarily holds memory pages that are inactive. Swap space is used when your
system decides that it needs physical memory for active processes and there is insufficient
unused physical memory available. If the system happens to need more memory resources or
space, inactive pages in physical memory are then moved to the swap space therefore freeing
up that physical memory for other uses. On a Windows machine, the swap space is a file
called [Link].

Almost everything on a RAM can be swapped if necessary, because of this we can find very
important and forensically interesting things in the swap space. Apart from plain-text data of
an encrypted text in a disk file we can even find encryption keys! Thanks to flaw-full
weaknesses in some applications that allow unencrypted keys to reside in memory. Also, part
of e-mails or matter stored at remote locations might still reside in swap space. And to relief
of all investigators, any standard disk maintenance utility can access this information.

On Windows, the swap file is a hidden file found in the root directory called [Link]. The
registry path for the swap file is (can be subject to change):

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HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\SessionManager\Memory
Management.

Several tools are available to retrieve slack space and swap space on windows system. Slack
space can retrieved using a popular tools like DriveSpy, Encase etc. The overall process of
retrieving involves following steps:

a) Connect to the computer.

b) Have a bit level image of original media.
c) Keep a hashed value of all images.
d) Use key word searches and hash analysis etc. using tools like Encase.
Tools like DriveSpy can be used to do some of the above processes.

[Link] File Carving

File carving can be used to recover data from a hard disk where the metadata is missing or
damaged, especially by professional data recovery companies.

When a file is deleted, only the entry in the file system metadata is removed, while the actual
data is still on the disk. After a format and even a repartitioning it might be that most of raw
data is untouched and can be recovered using file carving.

All file systems contain some metadata that describes the actual file system. At a minimum
the following is stored: the hierarchy of folders and files, with names for each. For each file is
also stored the physical address on the hard disk where the file is stored. As explained below,
a file might be scattered in fragments at different physical addresses.

File carving is the process of trying to recover files without this metadata. This is done by
analyzing the raw data and identifying what it is (text, executable, png, mp3, etc.). This can be
done in different ways, but the simplest is to look for headers. For instance, every Java class
file has as its first four bytes the hexadecimal value CA FE BA BE. Some files contain footers as
well, making it just as simple to identify the ending of the file.

Most file systems, such as FAT and UNIX Fast File System, work with the concept of clusters
of an equal and fixed size. For example, a FAT32 file system might be broken into clusters of
4 KB each. Any file smaller than 4 KB fits into a single cluster, and there is never more than
one file in each cluster. Files that take up more than 4 KB are allocated across many clusters.
Sometimes these clusters are all contiguous, while other times they are scattered across two or
potentially many more so called fragments, with each fragment containing a number of
contiguous clusters storing one part of the file's data. Obviously large files are more likely to
be fragmented.

File carving is a highly complex task, with a potentially huge number of permutations to try.
To make this task tractable, carving software typically makes extensive use of models and
heuristics. This is necessary not only from a standpoint of execution time, but also for the
accuracy of the results. State of the art file carving algorithms use statistical techniques
like sequential hypothesis testing for determining fragmentation points.

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[Link] Event logs
Event logs are stored in Metadata files. The entries in these files can be retrieved on a good
way depending upon how refining is carried out by investigators. The victim or suspect
system log entries change rapidly as the new events are recorded. The event logs can also be
configured minimal to maximum events and durations. We can use tools like Ps log list and
EVT to retrieve event records. See figure 19,20, 21.

Figure 19: PsLoglist output.

Figure 20: WDumEvt window (showing system).

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 Figure 21: WDumEvt window (showing apps).

1.5 SUMMARY
1. Digital Forensic examiners will most likely encounter Windows and will have to
collect evidence from it in almost all cyber-crime cases.
2. Forensics can be looked as Volatile and non-volatile information in Windows.
3. Volatile Information in Windows can disappear or be easily modified.
4. Non-volatile information remains on a secondary storage device and persists even
after power is off.
5. Major tools for extracting volatile information are PsLoggedon, Netsessions,
logonsessions, doskey uptime etc.
6. Tools that can be used to access information pertaining opened files are: Netfile,
PsFile, open files etc.
7. Tools like NetStat gives access to information partitioning current network
connections to the host computer
8. Tools like ipConfig, promiscDetect, promgry helps in getting the vital information
pertaining network interface cards (NIC) in Windows.
9. Registry information can have a good impact on the forensic analysis and
investigation and collecting these information would be very vital.
10. Tools like DevCon, Access Data tool kit, reg and regedit helps in extracting non-
volatile information in Windows.
11. Windows organises data using structures or elements like Cluster, Partition, Master
Boot Record, FAT32, New Technology File System.

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 12. Files that are deleted, lost, cached or unallocated can be retrieved using various
methods and tools.
1.6 CHECK YOUR PROGRESS
1. Fill in the blanks.

a) The Microsoft windows versions that are currently in use are __________ and
____________.
b) Major forensics areas in windows are __________ and ___________ information
c) _________is a utility for DOS and Microsoft Windows that adds command history
d) ___________ in windows contain latest copied area of memory which can be for later
use.
e) Tools like reg and regedit helps in to get ______________ via important keys.
f) In computer disk storage, a _______is a subdivision of a track on a magnetic disk or
optical disc.
g) ______________ is the amount of on-disk file space from the end of the logical record
information to the end of the physical disk record.
h) _________________ is the process of trying to recover files without a file system
metadata.
2. State True or False.

a) Volatile Information retains its contents even when the power is interrupted the stored
data is immediately lost.
b) System time, logged users, open files, network information and drives that are mapped
shared folders are examples of non-volatile information in windows.
c) Registry information is an example of volatile information
d) Group of sectors form a cluster.
e) When a file is deleted, the file system removes the file logically i.e. it removes all the
meta-data and stamps related to the file.
1.7 ANSWERS TO CHECK YOUR PROGRESS
1. Fill in the blanks.

a) Windows 8 and Windows 10.

b) Volatile and non-volatile.
c) Doskey.
d) Clipboards.
e) Registry entries.
f) Sector.
g) Slack space.
h) File carving.
2. State True or False

a) (F)
b) (F)
c) (F)

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 d) (T)
e) (T)
1.8 FURTHER READINGS
• Windows Forensic Analysis Toolkit, Third Edition: Advanced Analysis Techniques
for Windows 73rd Edition, by Harlan Carvey.
• File system forensic analysis 1st edition, by Brian carrier
• [Link]
sysadmins/
• Linda Volonino, Reynaldo Anzaldua; Computer Forensics For Dummies, Wiley
Publishing, Inc.
• Investigating Hard Disks, File and Operating Systems: EC-Council | Press
1.9 MODEL QUESTIONS
1. State the usage and forensic importance of PsLoggedon, Netsessions, logonsessions
tools.
2. How the deleted and lost files are recovered in a windows system?
3. Describe the disk and file structure in a windows system.
4. What is a slack space, swap space and file carving?
5. How is registry information important in windows forensics?
References, Article Source & Contributors
[1] Disk Sector, [Link] retrieved Nov 2015
[2] DriveSpy, [Link]
retrieved Nov 2015
[3] File Carving, [Link] retrieved Nov 2015
[4] Hard Disk Drive, [Link] retrieved Nov 2015
[5] Operating Systems, [Link] retrieved Nov
2015
[6] What is slack space, A Webopedia Definition,
[Link]/TERM/S/slack_space
Bibliography
[1] Windows System artefacts, [Link]
and-artifacts-in-digital-forensics-part-i-registry/, retrieved Nov 2015
[2] Tom Olzak, IT Security, [Link]
forensics-finding-hidden-data/, May 21, 2007, retrieved Nov 2015.

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 UNIT II: LOGS & EVENT ANALYSIS AND
PASSWORD CRACKING
2.1 LEARNING OBJECTIVES
After going through this unit, you will be able to:

• Understand registry and fetch various keys in registry related to event logs.
• Understand the event log file structure and know how event information can be
retrieved from log files correlate its use while doing forensic investigation.
• Know user account policies, audit policies and mechanisms of changing audit policy
and correlate its use while doing forensic investigation.
• Know various tools used for log and event analysis.
• Know basic ways passwords are stored in Windows and correlate while doing forensic
investigation.
• Understand various ways of password attacks (password hacking) and correlate while
doing forensic investigation.
• Know various tools for password hacking useful in forensic investigation.
2.2 INTRODUCTION
In this chapter we will discuss two very important aspects of windows and other systems
which plays very vital role in forensics. They are: Event logs and Password cracking. In
computer log management and intelligence, log analysis (or system and network log analysis)
is an art and science seeking to make sense out of computer-generated records (also called log
or audit trail records). The process of creating such records is called data logging. Typical
reasons why people perform log analysis are:

• Compliance with security policies

• Compliance with audit or regulation
• System troubleshooting
• Forensics (during investigations or in response to subpoena)
• Security incident response
The Security Log, in Microsoft Windows, is a log that contains records of login/logout
activity or other security-related events specified by the system's audit policy. Auditing allows
administrators to configure Windows to record operating system activity in the Security Log.
Event logging provides system administrators with information useful for diagnostics and
auditing. The different classes of events that will be logged, as well as what details will
appear in the event messages, are often considered early in the development cycle. Many
event logging technologies allow or even require each class of event to be assigned a unique
"code", which is used by the event logging software or a separate viewer (e.g., Event Viewer)
to format and output a human-readable message. This facilitates localization and allows
system administrators to more easily obtain information on problems that occur.

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Windows registry is also a very important source to maintain and manage logs. As well
registry also has variety of controls/keys where general records pertaining events etc. are
maintained which can be very vital during digital forensics.

In cryptanalysis and computer security, password cracking is the process of recovering

passwords from data that have been stored in or transmitted by a computer system. The
purpose of password cracking might be to help a user recover a forgotten password (installing
an entirely new password is less of a security risk, but it involves System Administration
privileges), to gain unauthorized access to a system, or as a preventive measure by System
Administrators to check for easily crack-able passwords. On a file-by-file basis, password
cracking is utilized to gain access to digital evidence for which a judge has allowed access but
the particular file's access is restricted.

2.3 WINDOWS REGISTRY

Windows registry keeps most of the information pertaining policies, status etc. in form of
keys, sub keys and values. Windows registry can be worked upon by administrator through
application like ‘regedit’. Windows can also be supplied with a command like tool like ’reg’
to help users work on registry. Registry contains hives under which sub keys are present.
These hives play important role in the overall functioning of the system.

2.3.1 Registry and forensics

An investigator can acquire quite a good deal of information by studying and analysing
registry. Many tools like ProDiscover, ProScript can be very handy to get a good deal of
analysis of registry entries. Registry entries can be used to acquire and analyse many
important information necessary for forensics analysis. These information use system, time
zone, shares, audit policy, wireless SSIDS, auto start locations, user login, activities, USB
removable devices, trusted devices, cache, cookie and history etc.

[Link] System information

Basic information of system can be acquired for registry. Certain system information and its
registry key are listed below:

Table 3: Various important log attributes and respective registry keys.

System Information Key

Computer Name SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\ComputerName\ActiveComputerName
Time of last shutdown SYSTEM\ControlSet00x\Control\Windows
Product name ,build, version etc. SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion
Time zone settings SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\TimeZoneInformation
User created shares SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\lanmanserver\Shares
Audit policy \SECURITY\Policy\PolAdtEv
Wireless SSIDs SOFTWARE\Microsoft\WZCSVC\Parameters\Interfaces\{GUID}
USB devices connected HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Enum\USBSTOR
last time HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\DeviceClasses
Mounted Devices HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\MountedDevices
User SAM\SAM\Domains\Account\Users\{RID}

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information stored in the user’s Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\UserAssist\{GUID}\Count
[Link]
most recently used \Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\RecentDocs
most recently used \Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\RunMRU
Search Assistant MRU Lists Software\Microsoft\Search Assistant\ACMru
Internet downloads directory Computer\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsof
Restore points HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\WindowsNT\CurrentVersion\SystemRestore

Table 3 list out few important keys and their paths. These information acquired using these
keys has to be recorded using Encase and can lead to many conclusions while putting up the
case.

‘Computers’ here is the name that the user gives to its computer. The name of computer
generally is made once in the lifetime usage of the system and hence it can be used to trace
various activities on network and internet carried by the user. Time of last shutdown is the
time at which the system was completely shut down. This information can lead us to know the
status of the user and time stamps of various files and can co-relate to give an idea of the
mental status of the suspect. Sometime user themselves create shared folders and applications
for others to use over local network or internet (remote desktops). This information can be
traced out to find and analyse what kind of things or information the user was trying to share
and thus stamps of the shared files/folders can also be analysed. Audit policy information can
be very useful as it can let us know about what types of information/events an investigator
should look for in the event log. Service set identifications (SSIDs) maintained by Windows
can be useful in situations where unauthorised access is need to be investigated and IP
addresses needs to be traced.

Artefacts of a USB devices connected to computer are also registered via PnP (plug and play)
manager. The sub key formed for every USB device under the key path in table 1 is of the
form Disk &Ven_###&Prod_###&Rev###. This and other information can be used to trace
and collect vital evidences pertaining to a case. Similar is the case with mounted devices
information under registry.

Many applications maintain MRU lists i.e. they keep a list of recently used files or
opened/created files. Also search assistant MRU lists are also maintained by search
applicants. MRU lists of connected systems etc. are also maintained. This information can of
genuine help to understand victim’s state of mind or condition just before the crime. System
restore points can be studied to understand how and when the user created back-ups. Restore
points can be used to understand long back status of the user work.

Events are any occurrences or triggering of an activity. The operating system logs some of
these occurrences or events. However, the key PolAdEvt in registry can be used to set audit
configuration in order to log events based on user requirements. Other key available for
logging events is:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Eventlog\<Event Log>

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One can view events logs from the control panel also (see Figure 21,Figure 22 and Figure 23).

Figure 21: System and Security in control panel

Figure 22: Event Viewer.

2.4 WINDOWS EVENT LOG FILE

In windows event logs are stored in binary format. Event logs are stored in form of headers
and set of records. The event logs are in form of headers and set of records. The event logs are
in form of pipe or buffer where event addition can lead to several of older events out of the
file.

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2.4.1 Windows Event Log File Format
Each log file consists of a Header record (given as ELF_LOGFILE_HEADER structure) and
the Body. The body again consists of Event records, the Cursor record and unused space. The
body could form a ring buffer, where the cursor record will mark the border between the
oldest and the newest event record. Unused space could be empty, slack and padding

Windows Event Log (EVT)– ForensicsWiki,

[Link]/wiki/Windows_Event_Log_(EVT)

The Windows XML Event Log (EVTX) format was introduces in Windows Vista as a
replacement for the Windows Event Log (EVT) format.

Whenever an event has to be written/created/updated ELF_LOGFILE_HEADER and

the ELF_EOF_RECORD structures are written in the event log.

Whenever and application needs to log (or is set in registry to log an event) it calls
ReportEvent function which adds an EVENTLOGRECORD structure taking the parameters
from the system (see figure 3).

Figure 23: Event logs and reporting in windows

The event records are organized in either non-wrapping or wrapping way. The non-wrapping
is a simple one where records are added between header and EOF record structures.

Non-wrapping:

HEADER (ELF_LOGFILE_HEADER)

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 EVENT 1 (EVENTLOGRECORD)

•
•
•
EVENT 2 (EVENTLOGRECORD)

EOF RECORD (ELF_EOF_RECORD)

Wrapping:

HEADER (ELF_LOGFILE_HEADER)
PART OF EVENT N (EVENTLOGRECORD)

EVENT N+1 (EVENTLOGRECORD)

•
•
•
EOF RECORD (ELF_EOF_RECORD)
Wasted space
EVENT 1 (EVENTLOGRECORD)
EVENT 2 (EVENTLOGRECORD)
•
•
•
PART OF EVENT N (EVENTLOGRECORD)

The Wrapping mode uses circular way of adding new records. In this an old record is
overwritten as new records come in.

2.4.2 Reading from an Windows event log file

On Windows the event logs can be managed with "Event Viewer" ([Link]) or
"Windows Events Command Line Utility" ([Link]). Event Viewer can represent the
EVTX (XML format) files in both "general view" (or formatted view) and "details view"
(which has both a "friendly view" and "XML view"). Note that the formatted view can hide
significant event data that is stored in the event record and can be seen in the detailed view.

An event viewer application like Windows Event Viewer or log parser uses
the OpenEventLog function to open the event log for an event source. Then the viewer
application uses the ReadEventLog function to read event records from the log. The following
diagram illustrates this process (see figure 4).

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 Figure 24: Process of viewing Event logs in windows.

2.4.3 Using Microsoft log parser

Logparser is a flexible command line utility that was initially written by Gabriele Giuseppini,
a Microsoft employee, to automate tests for IIS logging. It was intended for use with
the Windows operating system, and was included with the IIS 6.0 Resource Kit Tools. The
default behavior of logparser works like a "data processing pipeline", by taking
an SQL expression on the command line, and outputting the lines containing matches for the
SQL expression.

Microsoft describes Logparser as a powerful, versatile tool that provides universal query
access to text-based data such as log files, XML files and CSV files, as well as key data
sources on the Windows operating system such as the Event Log, the Registry, the file
system, and Active Directory. The results of the input query can be custom-formatted in text
based output, or they can be persisted to more specialty targets like SQL, SYSLOG, or
a chart.

Common usage:
$ logparser <options> <SQL expression>

Example: Selecting date, time and client username accessing ASPX-files, taken from all .log-
files in the current directory.

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$ logparser -i:IISW3C -q "SELECT date, time, cs-username FROM *.log WHERE cs-uri-
stem LIKE '%.aspx' ORDER BY date, time;"

Figure 25: LogParser.

2.4.4 Understanding Windows user account management logs

Audit policies in windows can be edited using local group policy editor (see figure 2).
Windows user account management security policy setting informs the operating system to
logs when the following user account management tasks are performed:

• On creation, changing, deletion, renaming, disabling, enabling, locking out, or

unlocking of an user account.
• On user account password change.
• On adding of Security identifier (SID) history to an user account.
• The restore mode password for Directory Services is set.
• Permissions on accounts are modified. Etc.
This policy setting is very useful for investigators in tracking events that involve getting sense
of user accounts.

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To view complete list of events in user account management please visit Microsoft site:
[Link]

2.4.5 Understanding Windows file and other object Access sets

Objects on internet or computer can be tracked using object access policy setting in audit
events. If appropriate object access auditing subcategories (like file operations, Registry etc.)
is enabled one can audit attempts to access a file, directory, registry key, or any other object
(see figure 2). Many other subcategories are Audit Application Generated, Audit Certification
Services, Audit Detailed File Share, Audit File Share, Audit File System, Audit Filtering
Platform Connection, Audit Kernel Object, Audit Other Object Access Events, Audit
Registry, Audit Security Account Management etc.

2.4.6 Auditing policy change

We can track the audit policy changes even. a local system or network Policy Change can be
tracked using audit policy change events. Policies are mostly centrally created by admin or
privileged users, thus, any changes or attempts to change these policies can be an important
aspect of security management as well as while gathering investigative information. Few
subcategories in this are: Audit Policy Change, Audit Authentication Policy Change, Audit
Authorization Policy Change, Audit Filtering Platform Policy Change, Audit MPSSVC Rule-
Level Policy Change, Audit Other Policy Change Events.

2.5 WINDOWS PASSWORD STORAGE

User and passwords in a window system are stored in either of two places:

a) SAM(Security Account Manager)

b) AD(Activity directory)
2.5.1 SAM
The Security Account Manager (SAM) is a database file in Windows XP, Windows
Vista and Windows 7 that stores users' passwords. It can be used to authenticate local and
remote users. Beginning with Windows 2000 SP4, Active Directory is used to authenticate
remote users. SAM uses cryptographic measures to prevent forbidden users to gain access to
the system.

The user passwords are stored in a hashed format in a registry hive either as a LM hash or as
a NTLM hash. This file can be found in %SystemRoot%/system32/config/SAMand is
mounted on HKLM/SAM.

In an attempt to improve the security of the SAM database against offline software
cracking, Microsoft introduced the SYSKEY function in Windows NT 4.0. When SYSKEY is
enabled, the on-disk copy of the SAM file is partially encrypted, so that the password hash
values for all local accounts stored in the SAM are encrypted with a key (usually also referred
to as the "SYSKEY"). It can be enabled by running the syskey program. Since a hash
function is one-way, this provides some measure of security for the storage of the passwords.

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In the case of online attacks, it is not possible to simply copy the SAM file to another
location. The SAM file cannot be moved or copied while Windows is running, since the
Windows kernel obtains and keeps an exclusive filesystem lock on the SAM file, and will not
release that lock until the operating system has shut down or a "Blue Screen of Death"
exception has been thrown. However, the in-memory copy of the contents of the SAM can be
dumped using various techniques (including pwdump), making the password hashes available
for offline brute-force attack.

[Link] Removing LM hash

Most versions of Windows can be configured to disable the creation and storage of valid LM
hashes when the user changes their password. This is the default setting in Windows Vista,
but was disabled by default in previous versions of Windows. Note: enabling this setting does
not immediately clear the LM hash values from the SAM, but rather enables an additional
check during password change operations that will instead store a "dummy" value in the
location in the SAM database where the LM hash is otherwise stored. (This dummy value has
no relationship to the user's password - it is the same value used for all user accounts.)

[Link] Related attacks

In Windows NT 3.51, NT 4.0 and 2000, an attack was devised to bypass the local
authentication system. If the SAM file is deleted from the hard drive (e.g. mounting the
Windows OS volume into an alternate operating system), the attacker could log in as any
account with no password. This flaw was corrected with Windows XP, which shows an error
message and shuts down the computer. However, there exist software utilities which, by the
aforementioned methodology of using either an emulated virtual drive, or boot disk (usually
Unix/Linux) based environment to mount the local drive housing the active NTFS partition,
and using programmed software routines and function calls from within assigned memory
stacks to isolate the SAM file from the Windows NT system installation directory structure
(default: %SystemRoot%/system32/config/SAM) and, depending on the particular software
utility being used, removes the password hashes stored for user accounts in their entirety, or in
some cases, modify the user account passwords directly from this environment.

This software has both a highly pragmatic and beneficial use as a password clearing or
account recovering utility for individuals who have lost or forgotten their windows account
passwords, as well as a possible use as a malicious software security bypassing utility.
Essentially granting a user with enough ability, experience, and familiarity with both the
cracking utility software and the security routines of the Windows NT kernel (as well as
offline and immediate local access to the target computer) the capability to entirely
bypass/remove the windows account passwords from a potential target computer. Only
recently, Microsoft released a utility called LockSmith, which is part of MSDart. MSDart is
not freely available to end-users, however.

2.5.2 AD
Active Directory (AD) is a directory service that Microsoft developed for Windows
domain networks and is included in most Windows Server operating systems as a set of
processes and services.

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An AD domain controller authenticates and authorizes all users and computers in a Windows
domain type network—assigning and enforcing security policies for all computers and
installing or updating software. For example, when a user logs into a computer that is part of a
Windows domain, Active Directory checks the submitted password and determines whether
the user is a system administrator or normal user.

Active Directory makes use of Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) versions 2 and
3, Microsoft's version of Kerberos, and DNS.

As a directory service, an Active Directory instance consists of a database and

corresponding executable code responsible for servicing requests and maintaining the
database. The executable part, known as Directory System Agent, is a collection of Windows
services and processes that run on Windows 2000 and later. Objects in Active Directory
databases can be accessed via LDAP, ADSI (a component object model interface), messaging
API and Security Accounts Manager services.

2.6 APPLICATION PASSWORDS CRACKERS

A password cracker is a program that can assist users to obtain unauthorised access to an
application or resources. Also, Password crackers can help users to retrieve lost or forgotten
passwords of any application.

2.6.1 Password cracking methods

Password crackers can use many ways to identify a password. The most important methods
are:
a) Brute force method
b) Dictionary searches
c) Syllable attack
d) Rule based attack
e) Hybrid attack
f) Password guessing
g) Rainbow attack
[Link] Brute force attack
Brute force attacks work by calculating every possible combination that could make up a
password and testing it to see if it is the correct password. As the password’s length increases,
the amount of time, on average, to find the correct password increases exponentially. This
means short passwords can usually be discovered quite quickly, but longer passwords may
take decades.

[Link] Dictionary attack

In cryptanalysis and computer security, a dictionary attack is a technique for defeating
a cipher or authentication mechanism by trying to determine its decryption key or passphrase
by trying hundreds or sometimes millions of likely possibilities, such as words in a dictionary.

A dictionary attack is based on trying all the strings in a pre-arranged listing, typically derived
from a list of words such as in a dictionary (hence the phrase dictionary attack. In contrast to

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a brute force attack, where a large proportion of the key space is searched systematically, a
dictionary attack tries only those possibilities which are deemed most likely to succeed.
Dictionary attacks often succeed because many people have a tendency to choose
short passwords that are ordinary words or common passwords, or simple variants obtained,
for example, by appending a digit or punctuation character. Dictionary attacks are relatively
easy to defeat, e.g. by choosing a password that is not a simple variant of a word found in any
dictionary or listing of commonly used passwords.

[Link] Syllable attack

It is a combination of the above two password attack. Many times the passwords does not
contain a dictionary word and in these cases syllables form dictionary words use token and
combined to every possible ways to do brute force searches.

[Link] Rule Based Attack

The attackers has many/ some preoccupied information using which the set of rules can be
formed and then the possible searches can be narrowed down to a great extent. This type of
attack is the most powerful one.

[Link] Hybrid attack and password guessing

It is also based on dictionary attack. In this if the old password is known than concatenating it
with other symbols can yield the right password. In case of guessing the common passwords
that are mostly used by novice users are used to crack codes.

[Link] Rainbow Attacks

Any computer system that requires password authentication must contain a database of
passwords, either hashed or in plaintext, and various methods of password storage exist.
Because the tables are vulnerable to theft, storing the plaintext password is dangerous. Most
databases therefore store a cryptographic hash of a user's password in the database. In such a
system, no one—including the authentication system—can determine what a user's password
is simply by looking at the value stored in the database. Instead, when a user enters his or her
password for authentication, it is hashed and that output is compared to the stored entry for
that user (which was hashed before being stored). If the two hashes match, access is granted.

Someone who gains access to the (hashed) password table cannot merely enter the user's
(hashed) database entry to gain access (using the hash as a password would of course fail
since the authentication system would hash that a second time, producing a result which does
not match the stored value, which was hashed only once). In order to learn a user's password,
a password which produces the same hashed value must be found.

Rainbow tables are one tool that has been developed in an effort to derive a password by
looking only at a hashed value.

Rainbow tables are not always needed, for there are simpler methods of hash reversal
available. Brute-force attacks and dictionary attacks are the simplest methods available;
however these are not adequate for systems that use large passwords, because of the difficulty

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of storing all the options available and searching through such a large database to perform a
reverse-lookup of a hash.

To address this issue of scale, reverse lookup tables were generated that stored only a smaller
selection of hashes that when reversed could generate long chains of passwords. Although the
reverse lookup of a hash in a chained table takes more computational time, the lookup table
itself can be much smaller, so hashes of longer passwords can be stored. Rainbow tables are a
refinement of this chaining technique and provide a solution to a problem called chain
collisions.

A rainbow table is a pre-computed table for reversing cryptographic hash functions, usually
for cracking password hashes. Tables are usually used in recovering a plaintext password up
to a certain length consisting of a limited set of characters. It is a practical example of
a space/time trade-off, using less computer processing time and more storage than a brute-
force attack which calculates a hash on every attempt, but more processing time and less
storage than a simple lookup table with one entry per hash. Use of a key derivation
function that employs a salt makes this attack infeasible.

[Link] System passwords

Every personal computer and in that matter all computers does have a system setting or
controls which are given by the hard core manufacturers to control access to system
configuration and files that are vital to the boot process. In many cases users set password to
the system control and there can be ways to break these passwords.

One way is to bypass the Bios password. Most of the manufacturers provide backup
passwords. These can be accessed by reading their user documentation carefully. Like for
example Dell gives backup password as “Dell” similarly Compaq gives as “Compaq”.
However, if these backup passwords are not working one can use a combination of case
sensitive back up passwords. Backup passwords are called as “Backdoor” passwords. While
typing system passwords it should be known that typing wrong passwords can lock the entire
system network and render a unstable device.

Another way is by re writing the CMOS Batter. Many times if the CMOS Battery is removed
and replaced after 20-30 minutes the BIOS passwords resets.

Also, by adjusting the jumper settings on a mother board, all custom settings, including BIOS
passwords will be cleaned. Location of these jumper settings may vary so we need to refer to
the system documentation.

2.6.2 Tools for passwords cracking

There are several tools /software available to assist passwords recovery or cracking. Few
examples are windows key generator, CMOSPwd, ERD commander.

[Link] CMOSPwd
CmosPwd decrypts password stored in cmos used to access BIOS SETUP. Works with the
following BIOSes - ACER/IBM BIOS - AMI BIOS - AMI WinBIOS 2.5 - Award

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4.5x/4.6x/6.0 - Compaq (1992) - Compaq (New version) - IBM (PS/2, Activa, Thinkpad) -
Packard Bell - Phoenix 1.00.09.AC0 (1994), a486 1.03, 1.04, 1.10 A03, 4.05 rev 1.02.943,
4.06 rev 1.13.1107 - Phoenix 4 release 6 (User) - Gateway Solo - Phoenix 4.0 release 6 -
Toshiba - Zenith AMI

[Link] ERDCommander
Microsoft DaRT is a successor of ERD Commander, which was part of the Winternals
Administrator Pack from Winternals. ERD Commander later became a Microsoft property
with its acquisition of Winternals on 17 July 2006.

Microsoft DaRT is based on Windows Preinstallation Environment now referred to as the

Windows Recovery Environment. The tool set includes:
• Registry editor: Edits Windows Registry
• Locksmith: Resets a user account's password
• Crash Analyzer: Analyzes crash dumps
• File Restore: Restores deleted files
• Disk Commander: Repairs volumes, master boot records and partitions
• Disk Wipe: Irrecoverably erases data from hard disk
• Computer Management: A group of utilities that help retrieve system information,
enable, disable or manage device drivers, Windows services and software that run
during computer startup, inspect the event logs of the offline system and manage
partitions.
• Explorer: A file manager
• Solution Wizard: A guidance tool that helps user choose the proper repair tool
• TCP/IP Config: Displays and modifies TCP/IP configuration
• Hotfix Uninstall: Uninstalls Windows hotfixes
• SFC Scan: Revives corrupted or deleted system files by copying them from the
Windows installation source
• Search: Searches a disk for files
• Defender (formerly Standalone System Sweeper): An antivirus that scans a system for
malware, rootkits, and potentially unwanted software. Uses the same engine as
Microsoft Security Essentials and other Microsoft antivirus products.
ERD Commander originally included more tools, including a web browser.
[Link] Office pwd recovery
Office Password Recovery Toolbox is software which recovers lost password to any
Microsoft Office document effectively. It can also recover read only files password. It allows
several features to users letting them to set parameters to the searching password range like
shape and length of the password. It enables users to search for string documents more
efficiently and quickly. It recovers read only passwords from Microsoft Office Access. It is
such type of application that can recover lost or forgotten password for Microsoft PowerPoint
presentations, Microsoft Excel spreadsheets, Microsoft Access databases, Microsoft Outlook
e-mail accounts, Microsoft OneNote notebooks etc. It can recover passwords instantly and
helps in modifying sheet protection passwords, workbook passwords, email account

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password, database passwords etc. It has user friendly interface which helps in extracting
searches. The Office Password Recovery Tool provides an efficient access to MS Office
documents.

Features:
• It recovers and removes all passwords of MS Excel, MS Outlook, MS Access
documents, MS Word and VBA projects.
• It is able to crack all the Office document passwords and enables them for
modifying workbook and worksheet passwords (Excel only), document protection
passwords, database, user work group passwords and VBA project passwords.
• The entire recently opened password protected Microsoft Office documents is
unprotected by using this software and opens the start up directly.
• It can access server’s unique passwords and can break MS Excel or MS Word
passwords irrespective of strength and length of password.
• It has the ability for protecting Office password Recovery Toolbox with password
in order to prevent unauthorized access.
[Link] Passware kit
Passware Kit Enterprise and Forensics Passware Kit can recover the password of up to 150
different file types. It is trade, not exactly cheap tools, but can be very useful in different
circumstances. This complete electronic evidence discovery solution reports all password-
protected items on a computer and gains access to these items using the fastest decryption and
password recovery algorithms. Many types of passwords are recovered or reset instantly, and
advanced acceleration methods are used to recover difficult passwords. Passware Kit Forensic
introduces a new attacks editor, which sets up the password recovery process in the most
precise way to provide the quickest decryption solution possible. The highest performance is
achieved with Distributed Password Recovery, using the computing power of multiple
computers.
Passware Kit Forensic includes a Portable version that runs from a USB drive and finds
encrypted files, recovers files and websites passwords without modifying files or settings on
the host computer. Perform a complete encrypted evidence discovery process without
installing Passware Kit on a target PC.

Passware Kit Forensic, complete with Passware FireWire Memory Imager, is the first
commercial software that decrypts BitLocker and TrueCrypt hard disks of the seized
computers without applying a time-consuming brute-force attack.

Key Features:

• Recovers passwords for 180+ file types and decrypts hard disks New!providing an all-
in-one user interface
• Scans computers and network for password-protected files (Encryption Analyzer
Professional included)
• Acquires memory images of the seized computers (FireWire Memory Imager
included) New!

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 • Retrieves electronic evidence in a matter of minutes from a Windows Desktop Search
Database (Search Index Examiner included)
• Supports Distributed and Cloud Computing password recovery New!
• Runs from a USB thumb drive and recovers passwords without installation on a target
PC (Portable Version included)
• Includes 1-year Subscription to updates

General Features

• Instantly recovers many password types

• Instantly decrypts MS Word and Excel files up to version 2003 (20 Credits for
Decryptum attack included)
• Resets passwords for Local and Domain Windows Administrators instantly
• Recovers encryption keys for hard disks protected with BitLocker in minutes,
including BitLocker ToGo New!
• Decrypts TrueCrypt volumes in minutes New!
• Provides 8 different password recovery attacks (and any combination of them) with an
easy-to-use setup wizard and drag & drop attacks editor
• Uses multiple-core CPUs and NVIDIA GPUs efficiently to speed up the password
recovery process by up to 45 times
• Uses Tableau TACC hardware accelerators to speed up the password recovery process
by up to 25 times
• Provides detailed reports with MD5 hash values
[Link] PDF Password Crackers
CrackPDF, Abcom PDF Password Cracker, and Advanced PDF Password Recovery can all
be used to access password-protected Adobe PDF files. CrackPDF and Abcom PDF Password
Cracker use brute force attacks to discover the passwords, while Advanced PDF Password
Recovery simply removes the password protection entirely.

2.7 SUMMARY
1. Event logs and Password cracking plays very important role in digital forensics.
2. Event logging provides system administrators with information useful for diagnostics
and auditing. Windows registry is also a very important source to maintain and
manage logs.
3. Password cracking is utilized to gain access to digital evidence for which a judge has
allowed access but the particular file's access is restricted.
4. Registry entries can be used to acquire and analyze much important information like
system, time zone, shares, audit policy, wireless SSIDS, auto start locations, user
login, activities, USB removable devices, trusted devices, cache, cookie and history
etc.
5. User and passwords in a window system are stored in either Security Account
Manager or Activity directory.

115
 6. The most important methods of password cracking are brute force method, dictionary
searches, syllable attack, rule based attack, hybrid attack, password guessing, rainbow
attack.
7. There are several tools /software available to assist passwords recovery or cracking.
Few examples are windows key generator, CMOSPwd, ERD commander.
2.8 CHECK YOUR PROGRESS
1. Fill in the blanks.

a) _______ and ______ can be very handy to get a good deal of analysis of registry
entries.
b) When an application calls the ____________ function to write an entry to the event
log, the system passes the parameters to the ____________.
c) An event viewer application uses the __________ function to open the event log for
an event source.
d) SAM Stands for ______.
e) the ______ subcategory needs to be enabled to audit file operations and the ______
subcategory needs to be enabled to audit registry accesses
2. State True or False

a) In windows event logs are stored in binary format.

b) Policy Change audit events do not allow you to track changes to important security
policies on a local system or network.
c) The Security Account Manager (SAM) is a database file in Windows.
d) Office Password Recovery Toolbox is software which stores lost password to any
Microsoft Office document effectively.
e) Non-wrapping can occur when the event log is created or when the event log is
cleared.
2.9 ANSWERS TO CHECK YOUR PROGRESS
1. Fill in the blanks.

a) ProDiscover, ProScript
b) ReportEvent, event-logging service
c) OpenEventLog
d) Security Account Manager.
e) File System, Registry
2. State True or False

a) True
b) False
c) True
d) False
e) True.

116
2.10 FURTHER READINGS
1. Linda Volonino, Reynaldo Anzaldua; Computer Forensics For Dummies, Wiley
Publishing, Inc.
2. Investigating Hard Disks, File and Operating Systems: EC-Council | Press
3. Windows Event Log (EVT) – ForensicsWiki,
[Link]/wiki/Windows_Event_Log_(EVT)
4. Audit User Account Management - TechNet – Microsoft,
[Link]
5. Event Log File Format (Windows) - MSDN – Microsoft,
[Link]
6. Policy Change - TechNet – Microsoft, [Link]
us/library/dd772669(v=ws.10).aspx
7. Reading from the Event Log (Windows) - MSDN – Microsoft,
[Link]

References, Article Source & Contributors

[1] Active Directory - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link]
[2] CMOSPwd, [Link]
[3] Dictionary attack - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link]
[4] Event logging – Wikipedia, [Link]
[5] Log analysis - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link] \
[6] logparser - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, [Link]
[7] Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack - Wikipedia, ,
[Link]
[8] Passware kit, [Link]
version_7549.html
[9] Password cracking - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link]
[10] Rainbow table - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link]
[11] Recover lost MS Office Password, [Link]
[12] Security Account Manager - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link]
[13] Windows XML Event Log, (EVTX),
[Link]

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 UNIT III: NETWORK FORENSICS
3.1 LEARNING OBJECTIVES
After going through this unit, you will be able to:
• Understand basic concepts of networking and its role in forensics.
• Understand the OSI and TCP/IP Layers and basic protocols which are pertinent for
forensics.
• Understand intrusion detection and prevention systems.
• Understand ways of capturing of network logs.
• Understand ways analysing network time stamps and data logs.
• Know and understand usage of various network tools used in forensics.
• Know and understand usage of various software tools used in forensics.
3.2 INTRODUCTION
There are many systems that track and record network activities and data. However, there are
still some measures that add up to the forensics on network systems. The network forensics
adds vital information to investigations. Tools can be used to do time line analysis, email re-
construction, Metadata analysis, packet frame analysis or checksum on data exchanged.
Another aspect of network forensics is to make/ get capabilities of capturing and investigating
a suspect’s computer over network. There are methods of making an image of a suspect/
victims computer over network connection form the forensics lab itself. However, legal
aspects must be considered before capturing/ intruding over other system. Network
forensics is a sub-branch of digital forensics relating to the monitoring and analysis of
computer network traffic for the purposes of information gathering, legal evidence, or
intrusion detection. Unlike other areas of digital forensics, network investigations deal with
volatile and dynamic information. Network traffic is transmitted and then lost, so network
forensics is often a pro-active investigation. Network forensics generally has two uses. The
first, relating to security, involves monitoring a network for anomalous traffic and identifying
intrusions. An attacker might be able to erase all log files on a compromised host; network-
based evidence might therefore be the only evidence available for forensic analysis.[3] The
second form relates to law enforcement. In this case analysis of captured network traffic can
include tasks such as reassembling transferred files, searching for keywords and parsing
human communication such as emails or chat sessions. In 2000 the FBI lured computer
hackers Aleksey Ivanov and Gorshkov to the United States for a fake job interview. By
monitoring network traffic from the pair's computers, the FBI identified passwords allowing
them to collect evidence directly from Russian-based computers.

3.3 NETWORK COMPONENTS AND THEIR FORENSICS

IMPORTANCE
A computer network or data network is a telecommunications network which allows
computers to exchange data. In computer networks, networked computing devices exchange
data with each other along network links (data connections). The connections between nodes

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are established using either cable media or wireless media. The best-known computer network
is the Internet.
Network computer devices that originate, route and terminate the data are called network
nodes. Nodes can include hosts such as personal computers, phones, servers as well
as networking hardware. Two such devices can be said to be networked together when one
device is able to exchange information with the other device, whether or not they have a direct
connection to each other.
Computer networks differ in the transmission media used to carry their signals,
the communications protocols to organize network traffic, the network's size, topology and
organizational intent. In most cases, communications protocols are layered on (i.e. work
using) other more specific or more general communications protocols, except for the physical
layer that directly deals with the transmission media. Computer networks
support applications such as access to the World Wide Web, shared use of application and
storage servers, printers, and fax machines, and use of email and instant
messaging applications.
3.3.1 Host
A network host is a computer or other device connected to a computer network. A network
host may offer information resources, services, and applications to users or other nodes on the
network. A network host is a network node that is assigned a network layer host address.

Computers participating in networks that use the Internet Protocol Suite may also be called IP
hosts. Specifically, computers participating in the Internet are called Internet hosts, sometimes
Internet nodes. Internet hosts and other IP hosts have one or more IP addresses assigned to
their network interfaces. The addresses are configured either manually by an administrator,
automatically at start-up by means of the Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP), or
by stateless address auto-configuration methods.

Every network host is a physical network node (i.e. a network device), but not every physical
network node is a host. Network devices such as modems, hubs and network switches are not
assigned host addresses (except sometimes for administrative purposes), and are consequently
not considered to be network hosts. Devices such as network printers and hardware
routers have IP addresses, but since they are not general-purpose computers, they are
sometimes not considered to be hosts.

Network hosts that participate in applications that use the client-server model of computing,
are classified as server or client systems. Network hosts may also function as nodes in peer-
to-peer applications, in which all nodes share and consume resources in an equipotent manner.

In operating systems, the term terminal host traditionally denotes a multi-user computer or
software providing services to computer terminals, or a computer that provides services to
smaller or less capable devices, such as a mainframe computer serving teletype terminals
or video terminals. Other examples are a telnet host (a telnet server) and an xhost (X Window
client).

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3.3.2 Node
In data communication, a physical network node may either be a data communication
equipment (DCE) such as a modem, hub, bridge or switch; or a data terminal
equipment(DTE) such as a digital telephone handset, a printer or a host computer, for
example a router, a workstation or a server.

If the network in question is a LAN or WAN, every LAN or WAN nodes (that are at
least data link layer devices) must have a MAC address, typically one for each network
interface controller it possesses. Examples are computers, packet switches, xDSL modems
(with Ethernet interface) and wireless LAN access points. Note that a hub constitutes a
physical network node, but does not constitute a LAN network node, since a hubbed network
logically is a bus network. Analogously, a repeater or PSTN modem (with serial interface) is a
physical network node but not a LAN node in this sense.

If the network in question is the Internet or an Intranet, many physical network nodes are host
computers, also known as Internet nodes, identified by an IP address, and all hosts are
physical network nodes. However, some datalink layer devices such as switches, bridges
and WLAN access points do not have an IP host address (except sometimes for administrative
purposes), and are not considered to be Internet nodes or hosts, but as physical network nodes
and LAN nodes.

If the network in question is a distributed system, the nodes are clients, servers or peers. A
peer may sometimes serve as client, sometimes server. In a peer-to-peer or overlay network,
nodes that actively route data for the other networked devices as well as themselves are
called super nodes.

Distributed systems may sometimes use virtual nodes so that the system is not oblivious to the
heterogeneity of the nodes. This issue is addressed with special algorithms, like consistent
hashing, as it is the case in Amazon's.

3.3.3 Router
A router is a networking device that forwards data packets between computer networks.
Routers perform the "traffic directing" functions on the Internet. A data packet is typically
forwarded from one router to another through the networks that constitute the internetwork
until it reaches its destination node.

A router is connected to two or more data lines from different networks (as opposed to
a network switch, which connects data lines from one single network). When a data packet
comes in on one of the lines, the router reads the address information in the packet to
determine its ultimate destination. Then, using information in its routing table or routing
policy, it directs the packet to the next network on its journey. This creates an
overlay internetwork.

The most familiar type of routers are home and small office routers that simply pass data,
such as web pages, email, IM, and videos between the home computers and the Internet. An

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example of a router would be the owner's cable or DSL router, which connects to the Internet
through an ISP. More sophisticated routers, such as enterprise routers, connect large business
or ISP networks up to the powerful core routers that forward data at high speed along
the optical fiber lines of the Internet backbone. Though routers are typically dedicated
hardware devices, use of software-based routers has grown increasingly common.

3.3.4 Switch
A network switch (also called switching hub, bridging hub, officially MAC Bridge) is
a computer networking device that connects devices together on a computer network, by
using packet switching to receive, process and forward data to the destination device. Unlike
less advanced network hubs, a network switch forwards data only to one or multiple devices
that need to receive it, rather than broadcasting the same data out of each of its ports.

A network switch is a multiport network bridge that uses hardware addresses to process and
forward data at the data link layer (layer 2) of the OSI model. Switches can also process data
at the network layer (layer 3) by additionally incorporating routing functionality that most
commonly uses IP addresses to perform packet forwarding; such switches are commonly
known as layer-3 switches or multilayer switches.

A switch is a device in a computer network that electrically and logically connects together
other devices. Multiple data cables are plugged into a switch to enable communication
between different networked devices. Switches manage the flow of data across a network by
transmitting a received message only to the one or more devices for which the message was
intended. Each networked device connected to a switch can be identified using a MAC
address, allowing the switch to regulate the flow of traffic. This maximizes the security and
efficiency of the network.

3.3.5 Hub
An Ethernet hub, active hub, network hub, repeater hub, multiport repeater, or simply hub is a
device for connecting multiple Ethernet devices together and making them act as a
single network segment. It has multiple input/output (I/O) ports, in which a signal introduced
at the input of any port appears at the output of every port except the original incoming. A hub
works at the physical layer (layer 1) of the OSI model. Repeater hubs also participate in
collision detection, forwarding a jam signal to all ports if it detects a collision. In addition to
standard 8P8C ("RJ45") ports, some hubs may also come with a BNC or Attachment Unit
Interface (AUI) connector to allow connection to legacy 10BASE2 or 10BASE5 network
segments.

Hubs are now largely obsolete, having been replaced by network switches except in very old
installations or specialized applications.

3.3.6 Network interface card (NIC)

A network interface controller (NIC, also known as a network interface card, network
adapter, LAN adapter or physical network interface, and by similar terms) is a computer
hardware component that connects a computer to a computer network. A device that usually

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holds the MAC (Media Access Control) address of your computer that uniquely identifies
your host or computer. The NIC is the physical bridge between the network and the host. If
you see on the back of your computer a wire with an oversized phone jack and blinking lights,
it is NIC.

3.4 OSI
The Open Systems Interconnection model (OSI Model) is a conceptual model that
characterizes and standardizes the communication functions of a telecommunication or
computing system without regard to their underlying internal structure and technology. Its
goal is the interoperability of diverse communication systems with standard protocols. The
model partitions a communication system into abstraction layers. The original version of the
model defined seven layers.
A layer serves the layer above it and is served by the layer below it. For example, a layer that
provides error-free communications across a network provides the path needed by
applications above it, while it calls the next lower layer to send and receive packets that
comprise the contents of that path. Two instances at the same layer are visualized as
connected by a horizontal connection in that layer.

3.4.1 OSI model

The OSI (Open System Interconnection) is a standard logical view of any networking. It has 7
layers as given in Figure 26. Figure 26 also depicts various form of data formats that are
exchanged between each layers of either side in a connectivity. It also gives main
functionalities of each layer as abstracted.

Figure 26: OSI Layers

3.4.2 TCP/IP Layers

Although the OSI model is widely used and often cited as the standard, TCP/IP protocol has
been used by most UNIX workstation vendors. TCP/IP is designed around a simple four-layer

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scheme. It does omit some features found under the OSI model. Also it combines the features
of some adjacent OSI layers and splits other layers apart. The four network layers defined by
TCP/IP model are as follows (also given in the figure 2):

• Layer 1 – Link: This layer defines the network hardware and device drivers.
• Layer 2 – Network: This layer is used for basic communication, addressing and
routing. TCP/IP uses IP and ICMP protocols at the network layer.
• Layer 3 – Transport: Handles communication among programs on a network. TCP and
UDP fall within this layer.
• Layer 4 – Application: End-user applications reside at this layer. Commonly used
applications include NFS, DNS, arp, rlogin, talk, ftp, ntp and traceroute.
The Internet protocol suite is the computer networking model and set of communications
protocols used on the Internet and similar computer networks. It is commonly known
as TCP/IP, from Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) and the Internet Protocol (IP).

TCP/IP provides end-to-end connectivity specifying how data should be packetized,

addressed, transmitted, routed and received at the destination. This functionality is organized
into four abstraction layers which are used to sort all related protocols according to the scope
of networking involved. From lowest to highest, the layers are the link layer, containing
communication technologies for a single network segment (link); the internet layer,
connecting hosts across independent networks, thus establishing internetworking;
the transport layer handling host-to-host communication; and the application layer, which
provides process-to-process application data exchange.

The TCP/IP model and related protocol models are maintained by the Internet Engineering
Task Force (IETF).

Encapsulation is used to provide abstraction of protocols and services. Encapsulation is

usually aligned with the division of the protocol suite into layers of general functionality. In
general, an application (the highest level of the model) uses a set of protocols to send its data
down the layers, being further encapsulated at each level.

The layers of the protocol suite near the top are logically closer to the user application, while
those near the bottom are logically closer to the physical transmission of the data. Viewing

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layers as providing or consuming a service is a method of abstraction to isolate upper layer
protocols from the details of transmitting bits over, for example, Ethernet and collision
detection, while the lower layers avoid having to know the details of each and every
application and its protocol.

Figure 27:Internetworking.

Figure 27 depicts two Internet hosts connected via two routers and the corresponding layers
used at each hop. The application on each host executes read and write operations as if the
processes were directly connected to each other by some kind of data pipe. Every other detail
of the communication is hidden from each process. The underlying mechanisms that transmit
data between the host computers are located in the lower protocol layers.

Figure 28: Encapsulation of application data descending through the layers

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Applying forensic methods on the Ethernet layer is done by eavesdropping bit streams with
tools called monitoring tools or sniffers. The most common tool on this layer
is Wireshark (formerly known as Ethereal) and tcpdump where tcpdump works mostly
on unix-like operating systems. These tools collect all data on this layer and allow the user to
filter for different events. With these tools, websites, email attachments, and other network
traffic can be reconstructed only if they are transmitted or received unencrypted. An
advantage of collecting this data is that it is directly connected to a host. If, for example the IP
address or the MAC address of a host at a certain time is known, all data sent to or from this
IP or MAC address can be filtered.

To establish the connection between IP and MAC address, it is useful to take a closer look at
auxiliary network protocols. The Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) tables list the MAC
addresses with the corresponding IP addresses.

To collect data on this layer, the network interface card (NIC) of a host can be put into
"promiscuous mode". In so doing, all traffic will be passed to the CPU, not only the traffic
meant for the host.

However, if an intruder or attacker is aware that his connection might be eavesdropped, he

might use encryption to secure his connection. It is almost impossible to break nowadays
encryption but the fact that a suspect's connection to another host is all the time encrypted
might indicate that the other host is an accomplice of the suspect.

On the network layer the Internet Protocol (IP) is responsible for directing the packets
generated by TCP through the network (e.g., the Internet) by adding source and destination
information which can be interpreted by routers all over the network. Cellular digital packet
networks, like GPRS, use similar protocols like IP, so the methods described for IP work with
them as well.

For the correct routing, every intermediate router must have a routing table to know where to
send the packet next. These routing tables are one of the best sources of information if
investigating a digital crime and trying to track down an attacker. To do this, it is necessary to
follow the packets of the attacker, reverse the sending route and find the computer the packet
came from (i.e., the attacker).

The internet can be a rich source of digital evidence including web browsing,
email, newsgroup, synchronous chat and peer-to-peer traffic. For example web server logs can
be used to show when (or if) suspect accessed information related to criminal activity. Email
accounts can often contain useful evidence; but email headers are easily faked and, so,
network forensics may be used to prove the exact origin of incriminating material. Network
forensics can also be used in order to find out who is using a particular computer by extracting
user account information from the network traffic.

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3.5 FORENSICS INFORMATION FROM NETWORK
Major information sources in network are: Host, router, fireworks, switches, and intrusion
detection and prevention systems, network printers/copiers etc. wireless access points. An
investigator needs to collect data from these sources. The categorization of these data as well
as way these needs to be collected and analysed is of utmost importance.

Hosts: Generally forensics makes use of agents (Software) to gather and send Host data to
remote forensic server. The agents collect real time data stream passing through the network
interface card (NIC) and send for analysis study.

Routers: Mostly router logs can be useful in many cases. Information of status details, errors,
IP and MAC addresses getting resolved to other networks or hosts can be used to trace a
suspect as well as can be helpful in getting to the chain of events while restructuring the
crime.

Firewalls: Firewalls also very importantly maintain logs of every internet/ network access by
the host user. These logs can be like dropped packets, un allowed application, filtered
websites, recognised attacks, etc. at many times the logs of the host firewall or the network
firewall is enough to trace the logs of the host firewall ir the network firewall is enough to
trace links to a crime or suspicious activity.

Switch: Switches have a CAM (context addressable memory) which keeps information about
mappings of MAC address to ports. Also, CAM is used to keep information about VLAN.

Two popular methods that are specifically designed to allow a network analyst to monitor
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traffic are :

1. Port mirroring – the switch sends a copy of network packets to a monitoring network
connection.
2. SMON – "Switch Monitoring" is described by RFC 2613 and is a protocol for
controlling facilities such as port mirroring.
3.5.1 Intrusion detection/ prevention system
An intrusion detection system (IDS) is a device or software application that monitors network
or system activities for malicious activities or policy violations and produces reports to a
management station. IDS come in a variety of “flavors” and approach the goal of detecting
suspicious traffic in different ways. There are network based (NIDS) and host based (HIDS)
intrusion detection systems. NIDS is a network security system focusing on the attacks that
come from the inside of the network (authorized users). Some systems may attempt to stop an
intrusion attempt but this is neither required nor expected of a monitoring system. Intrusion
detection and prevention systems (IDPS) are primarily focused on identifying possible
incidents, logging information about them, and reporting attempts.

Though they both relate to network security, an intrusion detection system (IDS) differs from
a firewall in that a firewall looks outwardly for intrusions in order to stop them from
happening. Firewalls limit access between networks to prevent intrusion and do not signal an

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attack from inside the network. An IDS evaluates a suspected intrusion once it has taken place
and signals an alarm. An IDS also watches for attacks that originate from within a system.

The logs generated by the IDS can be very useful for network forensics analysis.

Certain times network printers/copiers etc. also log the activities to some extent and can play
vital role in network forensics. However, the logs maintained depend upon the manufacturer.

3.5.2 Wireless Access Points

At times WAP can also come into play as it also maintains logs of almost all routing type
activities that it does like SSIDs and incoming connections etc. It is to be noted, looking at the
amount of traffic that follows in and out of a network it is important to understand the storage
aspects also. That is, how we will be storing these logs etc. for future analysis as well as
evidence building.

The investigators can use one or more of the available bilk storage technologies like SAN
(storage area network), network attached storage (NAS), direct attached storage (DAS) etc.
for the purpose. Also, tape drives are in use since older days and still play a vital role in mass
storages.

3.6 LOG ANALYSIS

The analysis of large volumes of data collected during IDPS is typically performed in a
separate database system run by the analysis team. Live systems are usually not dimensioned
to run extensive individual analysis without affecting the regular users. On the other hand, it is
methodically preferable to analyze data copies on separate systems and protect the analysis
teams against the accusation of altering original data.
Due to the nature of the data, the analysis focuses more often on the content of data than on
the database it is contained in. If the database itself is of interest then Database forensics are
applied.
In order to analyze large structured data sets with the intention of detecting financial crime it
takes at least three types of expertise in the team: A data analyst to perform the technical steps
and write the queries, a team member with extensive experience of the processes and internal
controls in the relevant area of the investigated company and a forensic scientist who is
familiar with patterns of fraudulent behavior.
After an initial analysis phase using methods of explorative data analysis the following phase
is usually highly iterative. Starting with a hypothesis on how the perpetrator might have
created a personal advantage the data is analyzed for supporting evidence. Following that the
hypothesis is refined or discarded.

The combination of different databases, in particular data from different systems or sources is
highly effective. These data sources are either unknown to the perpetrator or he/she cannot
manipulate them afterwards. Data Visualization is often used to display the results.

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There are many tools that can be used to analyse the logs captured during above sources of
information. However, still we need to understand how these analysis are done and how
actually a criminal event can be re-created. Major activities during log analysis are:

a) Analysing time stamps

b) Analysing data
3.6.1 Analyzing time stamps
Time and its synchronization in network are very important. A smart criminal can use certain
methodologies to put false time stamps in their communication. However with advent of
technologies like Network Time Protocol (NTP) this issue is more or less minimized. The
investigator needs to find out whether the NTP has been incorporated or not before
proceeding into the analysis. Network Time Protocol (NTP) is a networking protocol
for clock synchronization between computer systems over packet-switched, variable-
latency data networks. In operation since before 1985, NTP is one of the oldest Internet
protocols in current use. NTP was originally designed by David L. Mills of the University of
Delaware, who still oversees its development. NTP is intended to synchronize all participating
computers to within a few milliseconds of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC).

3.6.2 Analyzing data

Data over network in Transmission Control Protocol/ Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) is broken
into pieces which are further broken into smaller pieces called as packets to be transported
over networks. The packets are re-assembled at the other end. Different packets of the same
message might take different paths before reaching at other end. This adds to the complexity
of reassembling the packets. To overcome this issue TCP/IP follows a mechanism of
numbering each packet based on sequences. The receiver node sends acknowledgment based
on these sequence numbers. The message is reconstructed and the sending host gets
acknowledgement of all the packets sent over the network. The times stamps in these
acknowledgement packets are in GMT (UTC) format and can give vital clues during analysis.

Other protocol which has to be understood are Address resolution protocol (ARP) which is
used to map MAC address to an IP and vis-versa. This resolution protocols can help an
investigator get vital traces into IP addresses and MAC addresses of any individual in a case.
Other protocols/ technologies that need an overview are Internet control message protocol
(ICMP), Internet protocol security (IPSec), BitTorrent, Domain name system (DNS),
Dynamic host configuration protocol (DHCP), File transfer protocol (FTP), HyperText
Transfer Protocol (HTTP), Internet message access protocol (IMAP), Network time protocol
(NTP), Post office protocol version 3 (POP3), Secure shell (SSH), Simple mail transfer
protocol (SMTP) etc.

3.7 FORENSICS TOOLS

Forensic tools that are used for forensic activities like seizure, capture, analysis etc. in
network can be categorized in two forms:

a. Technology tools
b. Software tools

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Technology tools are like methodologies to track, trace or identify hidden artefacts in any
network system. The software tools are software solutions which can specifically assist
forensic collection etc.

3.7.1 Network tools used for forensics

Network tap
A network tap is a hardware device which provides a way to access the data flowing across
a computer network. In many cases, it is desirable for a third party to monitor the traffic
between two points in the network. If the network between points A and B consists of a
physical cable, a "network tap" may be the best way to accomplish this monitoring. The
network tap has (at least) three ports: an A port, a B port, and a monitor port. A tap inserted
between A and B passes all traffic through unimpeded, but also copies that same data to its
monitor port, enabling a third party to listen.

Network taps are commonly used for network intrusion detection systems, VoIP recording,
network probes, RMON probes, packet sniffers, and other monitoring and collection devices
and software that require access to a network segment. Taps are used in security applications
because they are non-obtrusive, are not detectable on the network (having no physical or
logical address), can deal with full-duplex and non-shared networks, and will usually pass
through traffic even if the tap stops working or loses power.

Once a network tap is in place, the network can be monitored without interfering with the
network itself. Other network monitoring solutions require in-band changes to network
devices, which meant that monitoring can impact the devices being monitored. Once a tap is
in place, a monitoring device can be connected to it as-needed without impacting the
monitored network.

Putting a network tap into place will disrupt the network being monitored for a short time.
Even so, a short disruption is preferable to taking a network down multiple times to deploy a
monitoring tool. Establishing good guidelines for the placement of network taps is
recommended.

Port Mirroring
Port mirroring is used on a network switch to send a copy of network packets seen on one
switch port (or an entire VLAN) to a network monitoring connection on another switch port.

Promiscous mode
In computer networking, promiscuous mode (often shortened to "promisc mode" or "promisc.
mode") is a mode for a wired network interface controller (NIC) or wireless network interface
controller (WNIC) that causes the controller to pass all traffic it receives to the central
processing unit (CPU) rather than passing only the frames that the controller is intended to
receive. This mode is normally used for packet sniffing that takes place on a router or on a
computer connected to a hub (instead of a switch) or one being part of a WLAN. Interfaces
are placed into promiscuous mode by software bridges often used with hardware
virtualization.
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Promiscuous mode is often used to diagnose network connectivity issues. There are programs
that make use of this feature to show the user all the data being transferred over the network.
Some protocols like FTP and Telnet transfer data and passwords in clear text, without
encryption, and network scanners can see this data. Therefore, computer users are encouraged
to stay away from insecure protocols like telnet and use more secure ones such as SSH.

3.7.2 Software tools used for network forensics

Wire shark
Wireshark is a free and open-source packet analyzer. It is used for network troubleshooting,
analysis, software and communications protocol development, and education. Originally
named Ethereal, the project was renamed Wireshark in May 2006 due to trademark issues.
Wireshark is cross-platform, using the GTK+ widget toolkit in current releases, and Qt in the
development version, to implement its user interface, and using pcap to capture packets; it
runs on Linux, OS X, BSD, Solaris, some other Unix-like operating systems, and Microsoft
Windows. There is also a terminal-based (non-GUI) version called TShark. Wireshark, and
the other programs distributed with it such as TShark, are free software, released under the
terms of the GNU General Public. Wireshark is very similar to tcpdump, but has
a graphical front-end, plus some integrated sorting and filtering options. Figure 4 depicts a
typical wireshark gui.
Wireshark lets the user put network interface controllers that support promiscuous mode into
that mode, so they can see all traffic visible on that interface, not just traffic addressed to one
of the interface's configured addresses and broadcast/multicast traffic. However, when
capturing with a packet analyzer in promiscuous mode on a port on a network switch, not all
traffic through the switch is necessarily sent to the port where the capture is done, so
capturing in promiscuous mode is not necessarily sufficient to see all network traffic. Port
mirroring or various network taps extend capture to any point on the network.
Wireshark is software that "understands" the structure (encapsulation) of different networking
protocols. It can parse and display the fields, along with their meanings as specified by
different networking protocols. Wireshark uses pcap to capture packets, so it can only capture
packets on the types of networks that pcap supports.

• Data can be captured "from the wire" from a live network connection or read from a file
of already-captured packets.
• Live data can be read from a number of types of networks, including Ethernet, IEEE
802.11, PPP, and loopback.
• Captured network data can be browsed via a GUI, or via the terminal (command line)
version of the utility, TShark.
• Captured files can be programmatically edited or converted via command-line switches to
the "editcap" program.
• Data display can be refined using a display filter.
• Plug-ins can be created for dissecting new protocols.

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• VoIP calls in the captured traffic can be detected. If encoded in a compatible encoding,
the media flow can even be played.
• Raw USB traffic can be captured.
Wireshark's native network trace file format is the libpcap format supported by libpcap and
WinPcap, so it can exchange captured network traces with other applications that use the
same format, including tcpdump and CA NetMaster. It can also read captures from other
network analyzers, such as snoop, Network General's Sniffer, and Microsoft Network
Monitor.

Figure 29: Wireshark GUI

TCPDUMP
Tcpdump is a common packet analyser that runs under the command line. It allows the user to
display TCP/IP and other packets being transmitted or received over a network to which the
computer is attached. Distributed under the BSD license, tcpdump is free software.

Tcpdump works on most Unix-like operating systems: Linux, Solaris, BSD, OS X, HP-
UX, Android and AIX among others. In those systems, tcpdump uses the libpcap library to
capture packets. The port of tcpdump for Windows is called WinDump; it uses WinPcap, the
Windows port of libpcap.

Tcpdump prints the contents of network packets. It can read packets from a network interface
card or from a previously created saved packet file. Tcpdump can write packets to standard
output or a file.

It is also possible to use tcpdump for the specific purpose of intercepting and displaying the
communications of another user or computer. A user with the necessary privileges on a
system acting as a router or gateway through which unencrypted traffic such
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as Telnet or HTTP passes can use tcpdump to view login IDs, passwords, the URLs and
content of websites being viewed, or any other unencrypted information.

3.8 SUMMARY
1. Network forensics is a sub-branch of digital forensics relating to the monitoring and
analysis of computer network traffic for the purposes of information gathering, legal
evidence, or intrusion detection.

2. Network components like host, node, router, switch, hub, NIC etc. all have to be
considered while examining a network forensically.

3. OSI and TCP/IP layers needs to be understood while doing forensics over networks.

4. Applying forensic methods on the Ethernet layer is done by eavesdropping bit streams
with tools called monitoring tools or sniffers like wireshark and tcpdump.

5. Intrusion detection and prevention systems (IDPS) are primarily focused on

identifying possible incidents, logging information about them, and reporting
attempts. The logs generated by the IDS can be very useful for network forensics
analysis.
6. In order to analyse large structured data sets with the intention of detecting financial
crime it takes at least three types of expertise in the team: A data analyst to perform
the technical steps and write the queries, a team member with extensive experience of
the processes and internal controls in the relevant area of the investigated company
and a forensic scientist who is familiar with patterns of fraudulent behaviour.
7. There are many tools that can be used to analyse the time stamps as well as data of the
logs captured during Intrusion detection and prevention systems and monitoring above
sources of information (components) in a network.
8. Technology tools are like methodologies to track, trace or identify hidden artefacts in
any network system. The software tools are software solutions which can specifically
assist forensic collection etc.
9. Tools can be used to do time line analysis, email re-construction, Metadata analysis,
packet frame analysis or checksum on data exchanged.

3.9 CHECK YOUR PROGRESS

1. Fill in the blanks.

i. Computers participating in networks that use the Internet Protocol Suite may also be
called _________.
ii. Modem, hub, bridge or switches are _____________ in a data communication.
iii. Digital telephone handset, a printer or a host computer are called as ___________ in a
data communication.

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 iv. A __________ is a networking device that forwards data packets between computer
networks. Routers perform the ___________ functions on the Internet.
v. A ___________ is a computer networking device that connects devices together on
a computer network, by using packet switching to receive, process and forward data to
the destination device.
vi. A ________________ is a computer hardware component that connects a computer to
a computer network.
vii. TCP/IP model has basically 4 layers they are: ________, ________, _________,
________ Layers.
viii. Applying forensic methods on the Ethernet layer is done by eavesdropping bit streams
with tools called _____________.
ix. A switch sends a copy of network packets to a monitoring network connection is
called as ___________.
x. ______________________ are primarily focused on identifying possible incidents,
logging information about them, and reporting attempts.
2. State True or False

i. Generally forensics makes use of agents (Software) to gather and send Host data to
remote forensic server.
ii. Routers have a CAM (context addressable memory) which keeps information about
mappings of MAC address to ports.
iii. Firewalls are example of IDS.
iv. Network Time Protocol (NTP) is a networking protocol for clock
synchronization between computer systems over packet-switched, variable-
latency data networks.
3.10 ANSWERS TO CHECK YOUR PROGRESS
1. Fill in the blanks.

a) IP hosts.
b) data communication equipment (DCE).
c) data terminal equipment(DTE.
d) router , "traffic directing".
e) network switch .
f) A network interface controller .
g) Link, Network,Transport, Application.
h) monitoring tools or sniffers.
i) Port Mirroring.
j) Intrusion detection and prevention systems (IDPS).
2. State True or False

i. (T)
ii. (F)
iii. (F)
iv. (T)

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3.11 FURTHER READINGS
1. Linda Volonino, Reynaldo Anzaldua; Computer Forensics For Dummies, Wiley
Publishing, Inc.
2. Investigating Hard Disks, File and Operating Systems: EC-Council | Press
3. Gary Palmer, A Road Map for Digital Forensic Research, Report from DFRWS 2001,
First Digital Forensic Research Workshop, Utica, New York, August 7 – 8, 2001,
Page(s) 27–30
3.12 MODEL QUESTIONS
1. State and explain various network components and their forensic importance.
2. How are the network logs captured and analysed? Explain.
3. What are IDS and IDPS?
4. State major features of wireshark tool.
5. What is promiscuous mode in networking?
6. What do you understand be network tapping and port mirroring?

References, Article Source & Contributors

[1] Computer network - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link]
[2] Ethernet hub - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link]
[3] Forensic data analysis - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link]
[4] Host (network) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link]
[5] Intrusion detection system - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link]
[6] Linda Volonino, Reynaldo Anzaldua; Computer Forensics For Dummies, Wiley
Publishing, Inc.
[7] Network forensics - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link]
[8] Network interface controller - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link]
[9] Network switch - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link]
[10] Network tap - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link]
[11] Network Time Protocol - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link]
[12] Node (networking) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link]
[13] OSI model - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link]

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[14] Port mirroring - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link]
[15] Promiscuous mode - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link]
[16] Router (computing) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link]
[17] TCP/IP 4 layer model, [Link]
[18] tcpdump - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, [Link]
[19] Wireshark - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
[Link]

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