Forensic Analysis of the Bumble Dating App for Android

António Barros,Miguel Frade,Rafaela Almeida,Tiézer Melo

doi:10.3390/forensicsci2010016

Abstract

Mobile applications that facilitate interaction between people have grown in popularity and, as a result, the number of e-dating applications have expanded. In these types of applications, there is usually a trade-off between user privacy and safety. On one hand, users want to keep their data as private as possible, on the other hand, user identification forces accountability, which, hopefully, will foster the development of responsible behaviors and minimize abuses. The Bumble e-dating app has been growing in popularity and differs from other apps by giving women the power to make the first contact after a match. Their main goal is to prevent women’s harassment. In this work, we study the digital artifacts that can be found after the use of the Bumble app on Android devices. Despite applying many measures to ensure data protection, it was possible to obtain information that identifies users and exchanged messages. The data structure stored on the device is described, as well as the artifacts with forensic value for an investigation. Moreover, a script was created to parse and visualize the main forensic artifacts of the Bumble app.

Highlights

Through technological evolution, smartphones have become mini-computers, possessing the ability to store and process data, perform tasks of high computational value, and access a large amount of information through Internet access [1]
Bumble stores its data in public and private directories, /sdcard/data/com.bumble.com and /data/data/com.bumble.com directories were the primary focus of our analysis
The private directory was the focal point of analysis since it revealed the most significant results, highlighting several forensics artifacts

Summary

Introduction

Smartphones have become mini-computers, possessing the ability to store and process data, perform tasks of high computational value, and access a large amount of information through Internet access [1]. Smartphones store a trove of user information, such as location data, captured images, videos and audio, and interactions in multiple social networks, from entertainment to e-dating. As such, these devices are an essential part of a digital forensic analysis process. Bumble currently has more than 10 million downloads on the Google Play Store (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.bumble.a pp, accessed on 28 December 2021), where its average rating is 3.9 in the opinion of approximately 280 thousands users. In the App Store (https://apps.apple.com/us/ app/bumble-dating-meet-people/id930441707, accessed on 28 December 2021), its rating is higher, being 4.2 out of one million reviews. In February 2021, Bumble stated that its market value was 13 billion dollars, an increase from the previous year when it was valued at around 8 billion [5]

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Conclusion