Digital Forensics and Malware Analysis Essentials Digital forensics and malware analysis are the two sides of modern cyber investigations. Forensic work focuses on evidence collection, integrity, and documentation. Malware analysis explains how malicious software behaves, which helps defenders understand and stop threats. Together, they help teams detect breaches, trace attackers, and improve defenses.
Core skills include:
Evidence handling and chain of custody Disk imaging and hashing Memory forensics Static and dynamic malware analysis Indicators of compromise and threat intelligence A solid workflow starts with a safe, isolated lab. Create a clean image of the suspect drive, verify it with cryptographic hashes, and preserve the original data. Then examine memory for artifacts that are hard to see on disk, such as running processes, network connections, and injected code. Use static analysis to read strings and packers, and dynamic analysis to observe behavior in a sandbox environment. Cross-check findings with known IOCs and behavioral rules to map an attack.
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