Smartwatches and fitness bands have gained great popularity worldwide. According to statistics, there were 216.43 million smartwatch users in 2022, generating an approximate revenue of $43.39 billion. Apple is leading this market with 30% of the market share.
There is no doubt that smartwatch data is important for digital investigations. Smartwatches store a treasure trove of vital evidence, like physical activity and GPS locations with time stamps and detailed health information.
In this article, we will discuss how you can extract data from smartwatches and fitness bands using Oxygen Forensic® Detective.
Extraction from the cloud
The most convenient way to extract smartwatch and fitness band data in our software is to get it from the cloud using Oxygen Forensic® Cloud Extractor. It supports the following health apps:
- Apple Health
- Samsung Health
- Huawei Health
- Mi Fit
- Fitbit
- Google Fit
Data extraction is available via username/password or token that can be extracted from a paired mobile device.
Evidence sets will include all the health data including activities, locations, and health details.
Extraction from mobile devices
Smartwatches synchronize their data with paired mobile devices. When extracting data from an Apple or Android device in Oxygen Forensic® Detective, you will extract the available health data that is shown in the relevant section.
For example, Apple Watch data will be displayed in the Health section of the extracted iPhone. The section will show the paired devices as well as all the data from them.
Oxygen Forensic® Detective also supports parsing of Google Fit, Fitbit, and Samsung Health apps.
Direct extraction
Oxygen Forensic® Detective is not intended for direct smartwatch extraction via cable. Smartwatches have limited data storage so their data is typically synchronized with a paired device, which Oxygen Forensic® Detective will extract data from. . In cases where there is no access to a paired device, a direct extraction from a smartwatch becomes important. Let us know if a direct smartwatch extraction is vital for your investigation.