Smartphone Forensic Analysis: A Case Study for Obtaining Root Access of an Android Samsung S3 Device and Analyse the Image without an Expensive Commercial Tool

Smartphone is a very useful and compact device that fits in person’s pocket, but at the same time it can be used as a tool for criminal activities. In this day and age, people increasingly rely on smart phones rather than desktop computers or laptops to exchange messages, share videos and audio messages. A smartphone is almost equivalent in its application to a PC, hence there are security risks associated with its use such as carrying out a digital crime or becoming a victim of one. Criminals can use smartphones for a number of activities. Namely, committing a fraud over e-mail, harassment via text messages, drug trafficking, child pornography, communications related to narcotics, etc. It is a great challenge for forensic experts to extract data from a smartphone for forensic purposes that can be used as evidence in the court of law. In this case study, I show how to obtain the root access of Samsung S3 phone, how to create DD image and then how to examine DD image via commercial tool like UFED physical analyzer trial version which doesn’t support Android devices? I will extract the messages for Viber on trial version of UFED Physical analyzer.