Hard Drive Unlocking

Recovering hard drive data is an integral part of computer forensics and has played a key part of many investigations. However this capability is getting significantly harder as sophisticated encryption and data protection mechanisms become routinely employed. The trend of encrypting data is growing due to market pressures and legal requirements for privacy laws, especially in the financial and medical industries. As a result of these market forces, it will become nearly impossible to gather data from hard drives, especially in the timely or covert manner required by many investigations. To aid in this arms race between secure data and law enforcement access needs, Cybernet proposes to create a tool that simplifies and automates accessing protected hard drives. Cybernet's Automated Drive Unlocking Tool (CADUT) comprises a software component that stores a database of known hard drive weaknesses and automated methods to apply them, and combines this with a hardware component designed to detect and attack implementation weaknesses of an unknown drive model using high-speed cracking and protocol fuzzing methods. As newer drive locking technologies and models are released, the database and hardware will be augmented as needed to remain competitive.