hi there,

just wondering if any1 knows anything abt cellphone forensic?

for e.g. i understand that IT forensic work allows people to retrieve even deleted messages, docs, previously visited websites from PCs and notebooks...... can the same be done for cellphones? i.e. retrieving deleted messages and pictures from cellhones?

hope you can help... thanks!;)

If it's deleted it's gone. Most cellphone companies have most of the information you retrieve from your phone, on servers with them, not on the phone itself. The thing is that IT forensic work doesn't retrieve things that are deleted, it retrieves things that people forgot about. Such as Window's history. If something is deleted from the computer, it doesn't exist on the harddrive anymore.

Originally posted by Blibblob
If it's deleted it's gone. Most cellphone companies have most of the information you retrieve from your phone, on servers with them, not on the phone itself. The thing is that IT forensic work doesn't retrieve things that are deleted, it retrieves things that people forgot about. Such as Window's history. If something is deleted from the computer, it doesn't exist on the harddrive anymore.
Untrue. Deleting files simply places a code in front of it on the hard drive that tells the OS that that particular part of the disk can be used now. The information still exists, until it is overwritten. The only way to really delete it is to replace it with all 0's, and that would take exactly as long as it took to create the file. That's why deleting files does not take as long as it does to create them. That's also why if you are throwing away a computer with sensitive information on the hard drive, simply formatting the drive is not enough. They recommend that you download some software that writes the whole drive with 0's.

Or you could take the hard drive and throw it onto the Interstate. :D

Untrue. Deleting files simply places a code in front of it on the hard drive that tells the OS that that particular part of the disk can be used now.
Alright... I didn't know that...

thanks guys for the inputs!

BorgHunter, u r saying that abt computer hard drives... but does it apply to cellphone cameras too? i.e. u mean to say that if we take a pic with a cellphone and accidentally deleted it.. there is still hope of retrieving it cos' it not really completely deleted from the phone's hard drive?

second ques i have is wat abt pic quality? e.g. if we take a shot and becos the resolution of the pic is so low on a cellphone camera, is there anyway that the pic quality can be enhanced somehow to make it clearer?

:)

I have no idea how cellphone stuff works, as I've never owned one. I don't now if the stuff is stored locally or on a server in Kansas somewhere.

As for pic quality, you can go down, but not up.

As for pic quality, you can go down, but not up.
Actually... Photoshop can extrapolate on the current pixels, so it can either zoom or enhance a pre done image. Of course it doesn't look as good as if it was taken at that resolution, but it can be enhanced a bit and still look really good.