Forensic Analysis of Footstep Data

Abstract: Digital forensics is a niche field of study that encompasses such things as extraction, analysis and presentation of digital information, that could be used to produce forensic evidence. There are several companies whose sole specialization is providing technical software solutions to detectives to help them quickly analyze retrieved devices that might contain evidence, instead of having to send the devices to forensic labs. However, there are still many areas that aren’t fully explored within the digital forensics industry, such as using personal health data. A factor that confounds this problem is that there are many different mobile devices running different operating systems and different versions of different applications. This report examines footstep data extraction and visualization on Android. Whether this data could be used as evidence according to law enforcement agencies is also investigated. Following a literature study to gain knowledge of the field of digital forensics, an experiment was conducted to gather data on a device through the Samsung Health application. This data was extracted and converted into a database, which was visualized using a prototype in the form of charts. Finally a technical trainer and former police officer was interviewed regarding whether the prototype could be seen as a proof-of-concept for future implementation among digital forensics solution providers. It was concluded that step data visualized in the form of graphs would be useful as forensic evidence for law enforcement detectives and juries.