Provided by: foremost_1.5.7-6_amd64 bug

NAME

       foremost - Recover files using their headers, footers, and data structures

SYNOPSIS

       foremost  [-h]  [-V]  [-d] [-vqwQT] [-b <blocksize>] [-o <dir>] [-t <type>] [-s <num>] [-i
       <file>]

BUILTIN FORMATS

       Recover files from a disk image based on file types specified by the  user  using  the  -t
       switch.

       jpg    Support  for  the  JFIF  and  Exif formats including implementations used in modern
              digital cameras.

       gif

       png

       bmp    Support for windows bmp format.

       avi

       exe    Support for Windows PE binaries, will extract DLL and EXE files  along  with  their
              compile times.

       mpg    Support for most MPEG files (must begin with 0x000001BA)

       wav

       riff   This  will  extract  AVI  and RIFF since they use the same file format (RIFF). note
              faster than running each separately.

       wmv    Note may also extract wma files as they have similar format.

       mov

       pdf

       ole    This will grab any file using the OLE file structure.   This  includes  PowerPoint,
              Word, Excel, Access, and StarWriter

       doc    Note  it  is  more efficient to run OLE as you get more bang for your buck.  If you
              wish to ignore all other ole files then use this.

       zip    Note is will extract .jar files as well because they use a  similar  format.   Open
              Office  docs are just zip'd XML files so they are extracted as well.  These include
              SXW, SXC, SXI, and SX? for undetermined OpenOffice files.  Office  2007  files  are
              also XML based (PPTX,DOCX,XLSX)

       rar

       htm

       cpp    C  source  code  detection, note this is primitive and may generate documents other
              than C code.

       mp4    Support for MP4 files.

       all    Run all pre-defined extraction methods. [Default if no -t is specified]

DESCRIPTION

       Recover files from a disk image based on headers and footers specified by the user.

       -h     Show a help screen and exit.

       -V     Show copyright information and exit.

       -d     Turn on indirect block detection, this works well for Unix file systems.

       -T     Time stamp the output directory so you don't have to delete  the  output  dir  when
              running multiple times.

       -v     Enables  verbose  mode. This causes more information regarding the current state of
              the program to be displayed on the screen, and is highly recommended.

       -q     Enables quick mode. In quick mode, only the start of each sector  is  searched  for
              matching  headers.  That  is,  the  header is searched only up to the length of the
              longest header. The rest of the sector, usually about 500 bytes, is  ignored.  This
              mode  makes  foremost  run  considerably faster, but it may cause you to miss files
              that are embedded in other files. For example, using quick mode  you  will  not  be
              able to find JPEG images embedded in Microsoft Word documents.

              Quick  mode  should not be used when examining NTFS file systems. Because NTFS will
              store small files inside the Master File Table, these files will be  missed  during
              quick mode.

       -Q     Enables Quiet mode. Most error messages will be suppressed.

       -w     Enables write audit only mode.  No files will be extracted.

       -a     Enables write all headers, perform no error detection in terms of corrupted files.

       -b number
              Allows  you  to specify the block size used in foremost.  This is relevant for file
              naming and quick  searches.   The  default  is  512.        ie.  foremost  -b  1024
              image.dd

       -k number
              Allows  you  to specify the chunk size used in foremost.  This can improve speed if
              you have enough RAM to fit the image in.   It  reduces  the  checking  that  occurs
              between   chunks  of  the  buffer.   For  example  if  you  had  >  500MB  of  RAM.
                   ie.  foremost -k 500 image.dd

       -i file
              The file is used as the input file.  If no input file is  specified  or  the  input
              file cannot be read then stdin is used.

       -o directory
              Recovered files are written to the directory directory.

       -c file
              Sets  the configuration file to use. If none is specified, the file "foremost.conf"
              from the current directory is used, if that doesn't exist then "/etc/foremost.conf"
              is  used.  The  format  for  the  configuration  file  is  described in the default
              configuration file included with this program. See the CONFIGURATION  FILE  section
              below for more information.

       -s number
              Skips  number  blocks  in  the  input file before beginning the search for headers.
                   ie.  foremost -s 512 -t jpeg -i /dev/hda1

       CONFIGURATION FILE
              The configuration file is used to control what types  of  files  foremost  searches
              for.   A   sample   configuration   file,  foremost.conf,  is  included  with  this
              distribution. For each file type,  the  configuration  file  describes  the  file's
              extension, whether the header and footer are case sensitive, the maximum file size,
              and the header and footer for the file. The footer field is optional,  but  header,
              size, case sensitivity, and extension are not!

              Any  line  that begins with a pound sign is considered a comment and ignored. Thus,
              to skip a file type just put a pound sign at the beginning of that line

              Headers and footers are decoded before use. To specify a value in  hexadecimal  use
              \x[0-f][0-f], and for octal use \[1-9][1-9][1-9].  Spaces can be represented by \s.
              Example: "\x4F\123\I\sCCI" decodes to "OSI CCI".

              To match any single character (aka a wildcard) use a ?. If you need to  search  for
              the  ?  character, you will need to change the wildcard line *and* every occurrence
              of the old wildcard character in the configuration file. Do not  forget  those  hex
              and octal values! ? is equal to \x3f and \063.

              There is a sample set of headers in the README file.

EXAMPLES

       Search for jpeg format skipping the first 100 blocks
              foremost -s 100 -t jpg -i image.dd

       Only generate an audit file, and print to the screen (verbose mode)
              foremost -av image.dd

       Search all defined types
              foremost -t all -i image.dd

       Search for gif and pdf's
              foremost -t gif,pdf -i image.dd

       Search for office documents and jpeg files in a Unix file system in verbose mode.
              foremost -vd -t ole,jpeg -i image.dd

       Run the default case
              foremost image.dd

AUTHORS

       Original  Code  written  by Special Agent Kris Kendall and Special Agent Jesse Kornblum of
       the United States Air Force Office of Special Investigations.

       Modification by Nick Mikus a Research Associate at the Naval  Postgraduate  School  Center
       for  Information  Systems Security Studies and Research.  The modification of Foremost was
       part of a masters thesis at NPS.

BUGS

       When compiling foremost on systems with versions of glibc 2.1.x or  older,  you  will  get
       some (harmless) compiler warnings regarding the implicit declaration of fseeko and ftello.
       You can safely ignore these warnings.

REPORTING BUGS

       Because Foremost could be used to obtain evidence for criminal prosecutions, we  take  all
       bug  reports  very  seriously.  Any  bug  that  jeopardizes the forensic integrity of this
       program could have serious consequenses. When submitting a bug report,  please  include  a
       description of the problem, how you found it, and your contact information.

       Send bug reports to:
       namikus AT users d0t sf d0t net

COPYRIGHT

       This  program  is  a  work  of the US Government. In accordance with 17 USC 105, copyright
       protection is not available for any work of the US Government.

       This is free software; see the source for copying conditions.  There is NO  warranty;  not
       even for MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.

SEE ALSO

       There is more information in the README file.

       Foremost  was  originally designed to imitate the functionality of CarvThis, a DOS program
       written by the Defense Computer Forensics Lab in in 1999.

                                         v1.5 - May 2009                              FOREMOST(8)