Digital forensic tools investigate, identify, extract, preserve, and digital document evidence. These tools help criminal courts get digital evidence from computers and other devices. Many open-source digital forensic tools simplify forensics. Digital forensics software (DFS) generates detailed criminal reports for court proceedings. Law enforcement needs a variety of instruments to combat and investigate cybercrime. Digital or electronic evidence can be used in court on various platforms. Open-source digital forensic tools can assist you in investigating illicit server access, mobile devices, or internal human resources cases. The forensic investigation uses physical evidence, network activity, fingerprints, data, emails, hard drives, and clues to determine how a crime was committed. Digital forensics tools always speed up investigations and produce better outcomes.
1. Wireshark
Wireshark is widely regarded as one of the most potent open-source forensic tools for analyzing network packets. It allows you to intercept data in real-time and decrypt it (it supports WEP, SSL, and IPsec). One of its most notable qualities is that it supports rich VoIP analysis, making it one of the live forensics solutions that offer this capability.
2. NMAP
Network Mapper, also known as NMAP for short, is one of the tools used for network scanning and auditing in cyber security. One of its primary benefits is that it is compatible with practically all of the widely used operating systems on the market today, including Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X, in addition to those operating systems that are not as often used, such as Solaris and HP-UX.
3. Oxygen Forensic Suite
Oxygen Forensic Suite is one of the most well-known open-source mobile forensics tools available today, and it may assist you in extracting the evidence you require from a mobile phone. It is also included on the list of Android forensic tools that allow you to circumvent the password or lock screen gesture prompt, giving you unrestricted access to the information stored on the device. Be sure to join up for the free trial, as there are no obligations attached, and SPF Pro is significantly more powerful and has more features.
4. The Sleuth Kit
You can extract data from hard disc drives and other storage media with the help of one of the open-source data-gathering tools for a digital forensic investigation called the Sleuth Kit. Because it is a set of applications run from the command line, it is possible that it is not the most user-friendly computer forensic tool currently available.
5. SIFT
SIFT is one of the best digital forensic tools available, and because it is built on Ubuntu, you can try it out for free and download it here. In addition to incorporating some of the most cutting-edge strategies for digital forensics, it possesses some of the most advanced open-source incident response functionality available.
6. Volatility
Memory forensics can be performed using the Volatility framework, released under the GPL license. It is one of the most excellent forensic imaging and cyber security forensics tools, and you can try it out for free. It gives you the power to extract information directly from the processes running on the computer. Because of its skills in analyzing malware and providing incident response, many forensics and cyber security experts use it. This digital forensics application also allows you to extract data from Windows crash dump files, DLLs, network sockets, and the network connection itself.
7. Free Hex Editor Neo
One of the best database forensics tools available, Free Hex Editor Neo, is excellent for working with huge files. It’s one of those forensic image applications that have a premium and a free edition that you can test out whenever you like for your data carving, extraction, low-level file manipulation, and the ability to run a deep search to find hidden data are some of its essential characteristics.
8. MVT
MVT is widely regarded as one of the most effective iOS and Android forensic tools available today, giving users the ability to decode encrypted backups and locate any signs of malware that may be present in the system. It will generate a report detailing which applications are installed on the mobile device, and information will be extracted as a JSON string. SPF Pro is an excellent option for you to consider. It provides superior functionality, continued support from the development team, an improved user experience, and offers a risk-free trial period.
9. Autopsy
This one will be right up your alley if you like open-source forensic tools with a graphical user interface (GUI). Tools for hard drive forensics, such as the one you’re looking at right now, provide you with everything you need to assess the state of the hard drive and recover files that have been deleted, fragmented, or rewritten. In addition, it enables the recovery of data from mobile devices, specifically smartphones.
10. FAW
Forensics Acquisition of Websites, also known as FAW (which stands for Forensics Acquisition of Websites), is one of the most effective digital forensic tools for examining websites. When you execute it, it will record the complete source code and any images it may contain and then investigate to determine whether or not it has any indications of illegal activity.
