AccessData Group has announced  a free version of its Mobile Phone Examiner Plus (MPE+), dubbed MPE+ Investigator, aimed at users looking to evaluate the software as well as lawyers, case investigators and others who may not have advanced forensics expertise.

It lets those who don't need the full functionality of MPE+ access the information collected via MPE+ as they develop their cases.

"We've heard from organisations, as well as current users of MPE+, that they wanted to demo our MPE+ prior to purchasing, and Investigator is designed to do just that," says Lee Reiber, Director of Mobile Forensics at AccessData.

"We also saw the need to allow users that may not have a forensic background a way to access the information collected by MPE+ in a safe, sound and easy to use medium. MPE+ Investigator lets them sift through and review the data rather than spend time requesting forensics experts to extract specific mobile forensics information and deliver it to them."

With MPE+ Investigator, users can import AD1 files collected with MPE+ and review, carve, export or print the collected data. The free software enables a variety of data views that isolate evidence collected by the examiner and makes identifying pertinent data more accessible. MPE+ Investigator is available now for free download from AccessData's web site.

AccessData also unveiled an enhanced version of MPE+, v4.7 which adds full physical support and decryption of iOS 4x and 5x as well as physical support of Android devices.

With support for more than 3500 phones, MPE+ integrates with AccessData Forensic Toolkit (FTK) to allow investigators to correlate evidence from multiple mobile devices with evidence from multiple computers, thus further increasing the efficiency and efficacy of digital forensics examiners.

MPE+ Tablet lets field examiners preview, acquire, and analyze evidence right at the scene of the device seizure. The MPE+ Tablet comes preconfigured with MPE+.