Cloud Forensics: A Review of Challenges, Solutions and Open Problems

Abstract

Cloud computing is a promising next generation computing paradigm which offers significant economic benefits to both commercial and public entities. Due to the unique combination of characteristics that cloud computing introduce, including; on-demand self-service, broad network access, resource pooling, rapid elasticity and measured service, digital investigations face various technical, legal and organizational challenges to keep up with current developments in the field of cloud computing. There are plenty of issues that need to be resolved in order to perform a proper digital investigation in the cloud environment. This paper examines the challenges in cloud forensics that are identified in the current research literature. Furthermore it explores the current research proposals and technical solutions addressed in the respective research. Ultimately, it highlights the open problems that need further efforts to be tackled.