Test Results for Hardware Write Block Device: WiebeTech Forensic SATADock (FireWire Interface)

• NCJ Number: 216300
• Date Published: December 2006
• Length: 18 pages
• Grant Number(s): 2003-IJ-R-029
• Agencies: NIJ
• Publication Type: Measurement/Evaluation Device

Annotation

This report presents results from testing the WiebeTech Forensic SATADock write blocker against the Hardware Write Blocker (HWB) Assertions and Test Plan Version 1.0.

Abstract

Four specifications were identified for the WiebeTech Forensic SATADock device: (1) a hardware write block (HWB) device shall not transmit a command to a protected storage device that modifies the data on the storage device; (2) a HWB device shall return the data requested by a read operation; (3) a HWB device shall return without modification any access-significant information requested from the drive; and (4) any error condition reported by the storage device to the HWB device shall be reported to the host. Results indicated that the device met the requirements of all four specifications. First, the WiebeTech Forensic SATADock always blocked any commands that would have changed user or operating system data stored on a protected drive (specification number one). The device also always allowed commands to read the protected drive (specification number two) and always returned access-significant information from the protected drive without modification (specification number three). Finally, on all tests run, the WiebeTech Forensic SATADock write blocker always returned error codes from the protected drive without modification (specification number four). The tests were run in the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s (NIST’s) Computer Forensics Tool Testing (CFTT) lab using one test computer: Freddy. A Data Transit bus protocol was used to monitor and record commands sent from the host to the write blocker. One of two Dell laptop computers was connected to each protocol analyzer to record commands. Support software is identified followed by the test results report key and a detailed description of the test parameters. Tables