Magnet AXIOM 7.6: 3D Printed Weapon Classifier, Protobuf Enhancements, and More

We’re thrilled to announce the release of Magnet AXIOM 7.6! In this release, we have added several new and updated features to streamline your workflows and help make your digital evidence analysis and reporting faster and easier, including:

• 3D Printed Weapon Classifier – a new addition to the image classifier in Magnet.AI to automatically identify 3D printed weapons and components
• Protobuf Viewer Enhancements – view Hex and Text as native Protocol Buffer data
• Google Workspace Shared Drive Acquisition – collect from Google drives, folders, and files that have been shared with an account 

To help keep your investigations current with the latest evidence sources, we have also updated and added to our artifact support. The artifact updates are listed below. 

You can upgrade to the latest version within AXIOM or at the Customer Portal. If you haven’t tried AXIOM yet, request a free trial here.

3D Printed Weapon Classifier

With this addition to the weapons classifier in Magnet.AI in AXIOM 7.6, you can search case data to quickly identify pictures containing traditional and 3D printed weapons and 3D printed weapon components. If a picture contains content that is a likely match for weapons, it will be tagged for later review in the Artifacts Explorer.

The number of incidents involving privately made firearms (PMFs) produced through 3D printing has been on the rise. Between 2020 and 2021, the number of PMFs seized in the US went from 8,500 to 19,000. These weapons are especially concerning because even designs that use a traditionally manufactured barrel don’t contain serial numbers, making tracing extremely difficult. 

This new classifier can speed up your investigation, so rather than manually sifting through countless images from different sources, the images are automatically surfaced using machine learning and image recognition to identify and categorize content so you can more quickly uncover the key evidence needed for a case.

Protobuf Viewer Enhancements

Building on the Protobuf viewer introduced in AXIOM 7.4, we have added the ability to right-click in a hex/text card to view and navigate data in its native Protobuf format.

Protobuf, or Protocol Buffer, is a free, open-source, cross-platform data format used to serialize structured data. Google developed Protobuf for internal use but then provided a code generator for multiple languages under an open-source license. As an efficient method for storing and transferring data, Protobuf is likely a format you will continue to encounter in your investigations.

For more background on Protobuf, check out our on-demand webinar: Add “Protobuf Expert” to your examiner’s resume

Google Workspace – Shared Drive Acquisition

With AXIOM 7.6, you can acquire potential evidence from Google Drive, including drives that have been shared with your targeted account. AXIOM provides the ability to acquire not only the files of a Google Drive but also the version history of files and the activity logs for all files within a Google Drive. The activity logs of files can provide insights into actions such as editing, renaming, or moving a file within a selected date range – helping you isolate the activities that you suspect are related to your investigation. 

Part of Google Workspace, Google Drive is a file storage and synchronization service that allows users to store files in the cloud, synchronize files across devices, and share files. Google Workspace has over 3 billion users with over 2.5 trillion files stored on Google Drive.

New and Updated Artifacts

New Artifacts

• iOS Messages Preferences

Updated Artifacts

• Facebook Contacts
• Facebook Messenger
• iOS Owner Information
• Safari Downloads
• Signal Messages
• Signal Users
• Snapchat Chat Messages
• Tinder Accounts

Get Magnet AXIOM 7.6 Today! 

We continually improve AXIOM to make it our most comprehensive digital forensic platform. When every second counts, it’s important that we do what we can to streamline the primary workflow of examiners. We’re excited that these AXIOM improvements can help to do exactly this. 

If you’re already using AXIOM, download 7.6 at the Customer Portal. To try AXIOM for yourself, request a free trial today! If your agency needs to perform remote collections, collect from cloud storage services, or Microsoft Office 365, check out what’s new in AXIOM Cyber here.