SPaRe: Efficient SQLite Recovery Using Database Schema Patterns

Abstract

In recent times, the Internet of Things (IoT) has rapidly emerged as one of the most influential information and communication technologies (ICT). The various constituents of the IoT together offer novel technological opportunities by facilitating the so-called “hyper-connected world.” The fundamental tasks that need to be performed to provide such a function involve the transceiving, storing, and analyzing of digital data. However, it is challenging to handle voluminous data with IoT devices because such devices generally lack sufficient computational capability. In this study, we examine the IoT from the perspective of security and digital forensics. SQLite is a light-weight database management system (DBMS) used in many IoT applications that stores private information. This information can be used in digital forensics as evidence. However, it is difficult to obtain critical evidence from IoT devices because the digital data stored in these devices is frequently deleted or updated. To address this issue, we propose Schema Pattern-based Recovery (SPaRe), an SQLite recovery scheme that leverages the pattern of a database schema. In particular, SPaRe exhaustively explores an SQLite database file and identifies all schematic patterns of a database record. We implemented SPaRe on an iPhone 6 running iOS 7 in order to test its performance. The results confirmed that SPaRe recovers an SQLite record at a high recovery rate.