You can run but you cannot hide from memory: Extracting IM evidence of Android apps

Smartphones have become a vital part of our business and everyday life, as they constitute the primary communication vector. Android dominates the smartphone market (86.2%) and has become pervasive, running in `smart' devices such as tablets, TV, watches, etc. Nowadays, instant messaging applications have become popular amongst smartphone users and since 2016 are the main way of messaging communication. Consequently, their inclusion in any forensics analysis is necessary as they constitute a source of valuable data, which might be used as (admissible) evidence. Often, their examination involves the extraction and analysis of the applications' databases that reside in the device's internal or external memory. The downfall of this method is the fact that databases can be tampered or erased, therefore the evidence might be accidentally or maliciously modified. In this paper, a methodology for retrieving instant messaging data from the volatile memory of Android smartphones is proposed, instead of the traditional database retrieval. The methodology is demonstrated with the use of a case study of four experiments, which provide insights regarding the behavior of such data in memory. Our experimental results show that a large amount of data can be retrieved from the memory, even if the device's battery is removed for a short time. In addition, the retrieved data are not only recent messages, but also messages sent a few months before data acquisition

Авантюризм в степах середньовічної України

Background: The need for new antibiotic drugs increases as pathogenic microorganisms continue to develop resistance against current antibiotics. We obtained samples from Antarctica as part of a search for new antimicrobial metabolites derived from filamentous fungi. This terrestrial environment in the South Pole is hostile and extreme due to a sparsely populated food web, low temperatures, and insufficient liquid water availability. We hypothesize that this environment could cause the development of fungal defense or survival mechanisms not found elsewhere. Results: We isolated a strain of Penicillium nalgiovense Laxa from a soil sample obtained from an abandoned penguin’s nest. Amphotericin B was the only metabolite secreted from P. nalgiovense Laxa with noticeable antimicrobial activity,with minimum inhibitory concentration of 0.125 µg/mL against Candida albicans. This is the first time that amphotericin B has been isolated from an organism other than the bacterium Streptomyces nodosus. In terms of amphotericin B production, cultures on solid medium proved to be a more reliable and favorable choice compared to a liquid. Conclusions: These results encourage further investigation of the many unexplored sampling sites characterized by extreme conditions, and confirm filamentous fungi as potential sources of metabolites with antimicrobial activity

On-scene triage open source forensic tool chests: Are they effective?

Considering that a triage related task may essentially make-or-break a digital investigation and the fact that a number of triage tools are freely available online but there is currently no mature framework for practically testing and evaluating them, in this paper we put three open source triage tools to the test. In an attempt to identify common issues, strengths and limitations we evaluate them both in terms of efficiency and compliance to published forensic principles. Our results show that due to the increased complexity and wide variety of system configurations, the triage tools should be made more adaptable, either dynamically or manually (depending on the case and context) instead of maintaining a monolithic functionality. © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved

Malassezia pachydermatis Carriage in Dog Owners

Malassezia pachydermatis is commonly carried on the hands of dog owners and may cause disease in immunocompromised persons

Evaluation multicentrique d'une méthode EUCAST pour tester la sensibilité antifongique des dermatophytes produisant des spores

Background: Terbinafine resistance is increasingly reported in Trichophyton rubrum and Trichophyton interdigitale rendering susceptibility testing important particularly in non-responding cases. We performed a multicentre evaluation of a recently proposed modified EUCAST method implementing medium supplemented with chloramphenicol and cycloheximide (CC) to avoid contamination. Materials/methods: A blinded panel of wild-type and squalene epoxidase (SQLE) target gene mutant T. rubrum and T. interdigitale strains were distributed to 10 European laboratories. Susceptibility to terbinafine, itraconazole, voriconazole and amorolfine) were performed according to the E.Def 9.3.1 method with and without addition of chloramphenicol and cycloheximide (final concentrations 50 mg/L and 300 mg/L, respectively). Plates were incubated at 25 °C (one laboratory used 30 °C) for 5-7 days until sufficient growth. MICs were determined visually (ignoring trailing growth for itraconazole) and spectrophotometrically with 90% and 50% endpoints yielding a total of 7,829 MICs. A. flavus ATCC 204304 and A. flavus CNM-CM1813 were included as controls. Results: 100%/96% (voriconazole) and 84%/84% (itraconazole) MIC determinations fell within the QC ranges for the two QC strains, respectively, and 96%/92% terbinafine MICs fell in a 0.25-1 mg/L 3 two-fold-dilution range suggesting a high interlaboratory reproducibility. Across the six methods, the number of terbinafine MEs varied from 2 (2.6%) to 5 (6.6%) for T. rubrum and between 0 and 2 (2.0%) for T. interdigitale (lowest for the CC-method (2.6%-4.4%/ 0-1% for T. rubrum/T. interdigitale). The difference between the modes for the wt and mutant population were ≥7 two-fold-dilutions in all cases (Table). If excluding a I121M/V237I T. rubrum mutant, and two mixed T. interdigitale strains, the number of VMEs were CC visual: T. rubrum: 1/77 (1.3%), CC spec-90%: 3/68 (4.4%) and CC spec-50%: 1/76 (1.3%), and none for T. interdigitale. The activity of voriconazole, itraconazole and amorolfine were quite uniform against T. rubrum and T. interdigitale, but unacceptably wide MIC ranges were found for the visual and spec-90% inhibition methods for itraconazole (data not shown). Conclusions: Although none of the laboratories perform dermatophyte testing at a regular basis an acceptable interlaboratory agreement and good separation between SQLE wt and mutants were found, suggesting a robust performance of the proposed method

Posaconazole MIC Distributions for Aspergillus fumigatus Species Complex by Four Methods: Impact of cyp51A Mutations on Estimation of Epidemiological Cutoff Values

ABSTRACT Estimating epidemiological cutoff endpoints (ECVs/ECOFFS) may be hindered by the overlap of MICs for mutant and nonmutant strains (strains harboring or not harboring mutations, respectively). Posaconazole MIC distributions for the Aspergillus fumigatus species complex were collected from 26 laboratories (in Australia, Canada, Europe, India, South and North America, and Taiwan) and published studies. Distributions that fulfilled CLSI criteria were pooled and ECVs were estimated. The sensitivity of three ECV analytical techniques (the ECOFFinder, normalized resistance interpretation [NRI], derivatization methods) to the inclusion of MICs for mutants was examined for three susceptibility testing methods (the CLSI, EUCAST, and Etest methods). The totals of posaconazole MICs for nonmutant isolates (isolates with no known cyp51A mutations) and mutant A. fumigatus isolates were as follows: by the CLSI method, 2,223 and 274, respectively; by the EUCAST method, 556 and 52, respectively; and by Etest, 1,365 and 29, respectively. MICs for 381 isolates with unknown mutational status were also evaluated with the Sensititre YeastOne system (SYO). We observed an overlap in posaconazole MICs among nonmutants and cyp51A mutants. At the commonly chosen percentage of the modeled wild-type population (97.5%), almost all ECVs remained the same when the MICs for nonmutant and mutant distributions were merged: ECOFFinder ECVs, 0.5 μg/ml for the CLSI method and 0.25 μg/ml for the EUCAST method and Etest; NRI ECVs, 0.5 μg/ml for all three methods. However, the ECOFFinder ECV for 95% of the nonmutant population by the CLSI method was 0.25 μg/ml. The tentative ECOFFinder ECV with SYO was 0.06 μg/ml (data from 3/8 laboratories). Derivatization ECVs with or without mutant inclusion were either 0.25 μg/ml (CLSI, EUCAST, Etest) or 0.06 μg/ml (SYO). It appears that ECV analytical techniques may not be vulnerable to overlap between presumptive wild-type isolates and cyp51A mutants when up to 11.6% of the estimated wild-type population includes mutants. KEYWORDS Aspergillus fumigatus, CLSI ECVs, ECVs, EUCAST ECVs, Etest, SYO, cyp51A mutants, posaconazole, triazole resistance, wild typ

Comment on: Multicentre validation of a EUCAST method for the antifungal susceptibility testing of microconidia-forming dermatophytes

peer reviewe

Emergence of Azole Resistance in Aspergillus fumigatus and Spread of a Single Resistance Mechanism

Paul Verweij and colleagues show that azole resistance has emerged inAspergillus fumigatus in The Netherlands and that a dominant resistance mechanism is present in clinical isolates

How to: interpret MICs of antifungal compounds according to the revised clinical breakpoints v. 10.0 European committee on antimicrobial susceptibility testing (EUCAST)

BACKGROUND: EUCAST has revised the definition of the susceptibility category "I" from "Intermediate" to "Susceptible, Increased exposure". This implies that "I" can be used where the drug-concentration at the site of infection is high, either because of dose escalation or through other means to ensure efficacy. Consequently, "I" is no longer used as a buffer-zone to prevent technical fact

Frequency and Evolution of Azole Resistance in Aspergillus fumigatus Associated with Treatment Failure1

An increase in the frequency of azole-resistant Aspergillus fumigatus has emerged