Metaspike Forensic Email Collector
Expertly preserve email evidence, plug and play output
In-place Search
We all run into cases where collecting a mailbox as a whole is not an option—often due to privacy or timeframe concerns. On the other hand, eDiscovery and digital forensics workflows often involve a full collection, followed by post-acquisition searches.Forensic Email Collector solves this problem in a creative way. You can perform instant in-place searches on mailboxes on the server before the acquisition and forensically preserve only the search results. No need to create labels, tag documents, or make any changes to the target mailbox. Have a list of terms or expressions to search for? You can load them from file and get a hit count report per line with a few clicks!
Google Drive Attachments
Files attached to emails as hyperlinks to a cloud storage system can throw a monkey wrench into your forensic preservation. The linked attachments often require authentication and are inaccessible unless handled as part of the initial acquisition.Forensic Email Collector automatically detects and acquires Google Drive attachments and revisions of emails during Gmail and Google Workspace acquisitions! Preserved cloud items are presented in a neat package with their parent emails to maintain parent/child relationships.
Flexible Authentication
Authenticating into the target mailbox is often the first hurdle when acquiring emails. Forensic Email Collector makes this a breeze with three powerful options.
Modern Authentication
FEC supports modern authentication via OAuth 2.0 when working with O365, Gmail / G Suite, and Microsoft’s consumer accounts such as Hotmail and Outlook.com. This allows both multi-factor authentication workflows and single sign-on (SSO) solutions such as Okta. No need to enable “access for less secure apps”.
Remote Authentication
Using FEC Remote Authenticator, custodians can authenticate FEC with their Gmail, G Suite, O365, and Microsoft consumer accounts from their own computer—Mac or PC. They can clearly see what data FEC has access to, and can revoke that access once the acquisition is complete. No need to share any passwords!
Enterprise Authentication
Who wants to learn everyone’s password or track end-users down to get authentication tokens when acquiring a large number of mailboxes from the same organization? FEC makes it possible to use a single set of administrator-level credentials to access end-user mailboxes when acquiring from G Suite, O365, or on-premises Exchange.
Server Metadata
We have created Forensic Email Collector with the final act in mind—the courtroom. During each acquisition, FEC captures server metadata such as IMAP UIDs, Gmail message and thread IDs, internal dates, and numerous MAPI properties from Exchange servers. These values are then decoded and presented in an effective way to make your investigation a success.If there was a hidden timestamp in that thread ID, wouldn’t you want to know about it before you wrote your expert report?
Battle-Tested Software
Some of the world’s most prestigious organizations—from law enforcement agencies to law firms, corporations, and service providers—trust Forensic Email Collector to secure email evidence in mission-critical projects.Its accuracy, reliability, and outstanding performance make Forensic Email Collector the go-to tool of professionals for anything from single mailbox collections to enterprise-wide email preservation projects.
Calendars, Contacts & Notes
Forensic Email Collector doesn’t stop at emails. You can also forensically acquire events from Google Calendars and appointments, contacts, and notes from Exchange servers.Just like emails, these items can be exported in MSG and PST formats in addition to generic formats such as iCalendar (.ics) and vCard (.vcf) depending on item type.
Comprehensive Connectivity
Forensic Email Collector can connect to most popular email servers and cloud email providers. You are not stuck with IMAP or POP for forensic email preservation.
Office 365 & Exchange via EWS
FEC can connect to Exchange servers—including Office 365—via Exchange Web Services. You can preserve emails faster and more accurately, and without having to configure the target Exchange server for IMAP access.
Gmail & G Suite via REST API
FEC authenticates with Gmail and G Suite using OAuth and forensically acquires mailboxes at eye-watering speeds via Gmail API. Say goodbye to downloading the same message multiple times because of overlapping labels.
Microsoft Graph
FEC uses Microsoft Graph API to connect to O365 mailboxes as well as Microsoft’s consumer accounts such as Hotmail, Outlook.com, and Live. Graph API provides support for modern authentication and powerful search capabilities.
IMAP & POP3
FEC connects to IMAP & POP servers in a read-only manner and preserves email evidence without modifying the target mailbox. Outlook.com, Hotmail, Yahoo Mail, Zoho, iCloud and AOL Mail are just a few supported providers.
It’s in The Details
We have added a few features to FEC to make sure it is a joy to use.
Exchange Autodiscover
When preserving email evidence from an Exchange server, you may not immediately know the Exchange Web Services (EWS) endpoint URL. FEC utilizes the Exchange Autodiscover service to automatically configure itself using the target email address and password.
Built-in Connection Profiles
FEC includes built-in connection profiles—including host name, protocol, port and SSL settings—for hundreds of popular domain names used by email service providers such as Gmail, Yahoo, Outlook.com and iCloud. If the target email address matches one of the profiles, server settings are populated automatically for you.
MX Lookup
As soon as you type the target email address, FEC checks the domain name to see if it fits one of the pre-configured profiles such as Gmail, Outlook.com, Yahoo, etc. If it does not, it looks up the mail exchanger records (MX records) to determine the mail servers handling email messaging for the target user’s domain.
Full IMAP Audit Trail
When you use the IMAP protocol, FEC keeps a detailed log of IMAP communications with the server in addition to its standard acquisition and exception logs. You can do a play-by-play of what FEC asked the server and how the server responded if that’s your thing.