Review study on Information Gathering Using OSINT for Forensic Investigations

DOI

10.2991/978-94-6239-610-4_24How to use a DOI?

Keywords

OSINT; OSINT Framework; Information Gathering; Digital Footprint; Reconnaissance; Digital Evidence

Abstract

In the current era of Digital Forensics, evidence collection and gathering information related to the crime, victim and the attacker is crucial, these evidences can be available at the scene of crime or in the larger databases like the Internet. The data which is present in the internet about a person or an organization is found in the public records and databases. This collection of the data which is publicly available can be performed with the help of OSINT, Open-Source Intelligence, using OSINT we can systematically collect, analyze and interpret the public databases. OSINT tools are mostly found all over the internet with each domain focusing on a specific type of data. OSINT can also be performed using Kali Linux based commands for a simpler and broader user data search. This paper provides a review on the information gathering tools and software which are available for open source while analyzing the accuracy of the selected software along with its legal, technical and ethical considerations. This paper includes rigorous searching for the information over the internet along with evaluating its accuracy and relevance in accordance to the source. In the process of gathering information related to a specific person we find the person’s digital footprint and their interaction with various platforms. This paper also highlights the future directions of OSINT, its credibility and reliability of the results.

Copyright

© 2026 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Mekala Rahul Reddy
AU  - M. Bharadwaj
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/05/05
TI  - Review study on Information Gathering Using OSINT for Forensic Investigations
BT  - Proceedings of the First International Conference on Advances in Forensics and Cyber Technologies (ICFACT 2025)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 241
EP  - 264
SN  - 2352-538X
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-94-6239-610-4_24
DO  - 10.2991/978-94-6239-610-4_24
ID  - Reddy2026
ER  -