The forensic use of mobile phone flasher boxes

Although mobile phone flasher boxes have been used by forensic examiners for some time now, no validation tests have been published to this date. This paper investigates the use of flasher boxes in a forensic setting and proposes validation tests for this relatively new acquisition method. Furthermore, pitfalls and possibilities of forensic flasher box use are discussed as well as its position in the current workflow.When carefully used, the use of flasher boxes in a forensic setting seems very promising. Validation is an important factor in the success of the method. Although soundness cannot be guaranteed in all cases, the method is much more transparent than the currently wide-spread toolkits. The tests in this paper provide a reasonably solid base for flasher box use without introducing excessive amounts of extra work for the examiner.