Dr.Foneis one of the best iPhone data recovery application that enables you to get back. Up to 31 data types can be recovered from iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch. All files can be recovered from iTunes or iCloud backups. As for media file, you may only get the thumbnails of photos and videos when switching to 'Recover from iOS Device' but it is possible to retrieve from backups and iCloud synced data.
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There is no lack of tools claiming the ability to recover lost or deleted information from the iPhone. These tools’ claims range from “Recover data lost due to water damaged, broken, deletion, device loss, etc.” to the much more reserved “Selectively recovers iPhone data from internal memory, iCloud, and iTunes”. Do any of those tools actually work, and do they live up to the user’s expectations? The answer is complex, hence this article. Let us place the claims through our usual scrutiny.
The “water damaged” iPhone
When researching the various data iOS recovery tools, I was baffled by the very ambitious claim made by one data recovery company (you’ll easily find it if you look). The company makes a bold statement, claiming that its tool can “Recover data lost due to water damaged, broken, deletion, device loss, etc.” (original spelling preserved). Let’s first deal with the “water damaged” claim, as in “the device doesn’t power on”.
User expectations: The bold claim makes me think that the tool can somehow magically extract information from a sunk device that cannot be powered on.
Reality: This is not going to happen. While a specialized data recovery lab could try temporarily reviving the water-damaged iPhone for the time they need to copy your data off the device (and charge you an arm and a leg for just trying), no end-user software (and definitely no free software) can do that.
What the tool does: Interestingly, the claim is not necessarily a lie. It’s marketing. The data recovery tool can try downloading (thus “recovering”) information from your iCloud account. This may include backups (although we are yet to see a tool that can do that reliably, let alone free of charge) and some synchronized data (which may include your photos if you enabled the iCloud Photos setting in your iPhone). We have not seen any consumer-grade tool that can download your passwords or messages (SMS and iMessage history) because end-to-end encryption.
Limitations: “Downloading iCloud backups and photos” sounds good enough; let’s do that! While this may be possible (as in “you may be able to find a tool that actually works”), the problem is whether you have those backups at all. The many years of experience have taught me that the more valuable and unique data the user has, the less likely he or she will have a backup of that data. If you are reading this article, do check if you have a recent iCloud backup of your device, and if you have iCloud Photos enabled.
Since Apple only offers 5GB of iCloud space free of charge, most probably neither the backups nor photos will fit, so most likely you’ll end up with some very old backups and few, if any, photos. Paying for additional space in iCloud is one way to ensure your photos are backed up. Another is using a third-party cloud provider (e.g. Google Photos or Microsoft OneDrive) to back up your photos.
The right way: If all you need is your photos, and you had iCloud Photos enabled, you can download them easily to your computer without any third-party tools at all. For macOS, just connect your Apple account and use the Photos app. In Windows, Set up and use iCloud Photos on your Windows PC.
The “broken” iPhone
How the “broken” iPhone is different from “water damaged”? If the device cannot be powered on, there is no difference from the point of data recovery. However, the “broken” iPhone might have its display shattered and the touch functionality not working. If this is the case, you may be unable to unlock the device as you won’t be able to enter your passcode. Interestingly, in certain cases the data can be recovered from such devices.
User expectations: I plug the phone to the computer, and the tool connects through whatever magic protocol and pulls the data.
Reality: This may happen if you can unlock your iPhone (e.g. with Touch ID/Face ID) and the phone was previously “trusted” on your computer (a lockdown file/iTunes pairing record exists). Otherwise, you’ll have to enter the passcode on the device to establish trust relationship between the computer and the phone. Assuming that your touch screen is broken, you’re out of luck. Replacing the display might be your best recourse.
What the tool does: The tool will attempt to make a backup and/or pull your photos (that’s a different protocol that works even if your backups are password-protected). This is similar to the advanced logical acquisition process we do in Elcomsoft iOS Forensic Toolkit. Some of the more advanced data recovery tools may take advantage of existing pairing records/lockdown files, while others will not.
Limitations: You must had established a trusted relationship between your iPhone and your computer before it was broken. If there no trust exists, you’ll have to type the screen lock passcode on your iPhone to establish one, which may not be possible if the touch screen is broken.
The right way: If all you need is your photos, and if you had previously paired your iPhone with your computer, you can import them to your computer without third-party tools by following the instructions. Learn how to Import photos and videos from phone to PC. However, if you want to review your text messages/iMessages, or if you need some other information, you will need creating an iTunes-format first, and a tool to analyze that backup. Apple does not make tools for analyzing iTunes backups (only allowing you to restore the data to a new iPhone), so a third-party tool can help you. We are offering Elcomsoft Phone Viewer just for that purpose.
The “deleted data”
The “deleted data recovery” claim is the most ambiguous. While users expect the ability to recover deleted files of any kind, this is not the case. In the iPhone, almost every user file is stored encrypted. The file system employs file-based encryption with separate, unique encryption keys for every file. Once a file is deleted, the encryption key is momentarily destroyed, making it impossible to “undelete” or recover that file even if one had low-level access to the data partition (which, by the way, is not possible without a jailbreak or exploit).
However, certain types of data can still be recovered – simply because they either aren’t files or aren’t really deleted. These types of data include:
Photos and videos. Once you delete a picture on the iPhone, the system does not actually delete the file. Instead, the image is moved to a special album (the “Recently Deleted” folder). Photos are kept in the Recently Deleted album for at least 30 days. During that period, users can easily restore their deleted pictures.
Messages. Your text messages and iMessages are stored in a database in the SQLite format. By default, SQLite does not overwrite records immediately after they’ve been deleted. Instead, SQLite marks them as “deleted”. Deleted pages become unused, and are stored on what is called a “freelist”. If you obtain the database files (by making a backup), these records can be recovered until the moment the database is fully vacuumed and defragmented (if it is, the deletion becomes permanent). This used to be the case in iOS 8 through iOS 11. Starting with iOS 12, Apple seemingly moved to a non-standard implementation, physically wiping records almost immediately after they are deleted. As a result, deleted text messages and iMessages cannot be recovered in iOS 12, 13 and newer.
Bookmarks. Deleted Safari bookmarks are stored in the HomeDomain/Library/Safari/Bookmarks.db database in SQLite format. Deleted bookmarks could be recovered from the SQLite database up to and including iOS 12. Starting with iOS 13, deleted bookmarks can no longer be recovered.
History. Safari browsing history is stored in the AppDomain-com.apple.mobilesafari/Library/Safari/History.db SQLite database. Starting with iOS 12, deleted Safari history can no longer be recovered.
Tabs. Starting with iOS 10, Safari open tabs are stored in the AppDomain-com.apple.mobilesafari/Library/Safari/BrowserState.db SQLite database. In iOS 10 and 11, open tabs would be stored indefinitely until closed, including tabs opened in the Private browsing sessions. However, even after the tabs have been closed, they could still be recovered. Starting with iOS 12, this is no longer the case. iOS 13 brings an additional protection mechanism, allowing users to specify the maximum period of time a tab can remain opened, automatically closing the tab and wiping the corresponding record after that period of time. In iOS 12 and 13, information about closed Safari tabs can no longer be recovered.
Reading List stores Bookmarks with com.apple.ReadingList as a parent. Items deleted from the Reading List can no longer be recovered since iOS 13.
Contacts, calendars, notes, and call history. All of these are also stored in their corresponding SQLite databases. Deleted records can be recovered by pulling and scanning the database files unless the database has been vacuumed and defragmented.
Files in the Files app. Files you store on your device in the Files app are moved to the Recently Deleted folder once you delete them. You can find and restore those files by opening the Locations > Recently Deleted folder.
Files in iCloud Drive. Just like the photos and videos, files you store in iCloud Drive aren’t immediately deleted. According to Apple, “When you delete a file from iCloud Drive, it goes into the Recently Deleted folder. If you change your mind or accidentally delete a file, you have 30 days to get it back. Go to Locations > Recently Deleted. Select the file that you want to keep and tap Recover. After 30 days, your files are removed from Recently Deleted.”
As you can see, most data can be only “recovered” (the proper term would be “restored”) from previously made backups – if you have ever made those backups anyway.
Below is a quick table to sum it all up. As you can see, starting with iOS 13 almost nothing can be recovered regardless of the type of backup you have (iTunes, iCloud, synchronized data or the TAR or ZIP file produced via file system imaging).
Deleted data, Part II
Okay, so we’ve got the grip of the “deleted” part. In older versions of iOS (and this is where most of the “iOS data recovery” tools grow their legs), anything stored in SQLite databases you might be able to recover given that the database had not been vacuumed and compacted. The only problem: it no longer works today. Some types of data became unrecoverable in iOS 12, while Apple started wiping the rest in iOS 13. Today, most iOS data recovery tools relying on SQLite freelists are useless.
Technically speaking, one could possibly access SQLite databases directly via a jailbreak or exploit. This is not going to be a one-button solution, far from it, and you will not gain access to most deleted records anyway. You’ll need a low-level forensic-grade extraction tool (e.g. Elcomsoft iOS Forensic Toolkit) and a tool like SQLite Forensic Toolkit to analyze write-ahead logs (WAL). Alternatively, forensic-grade software such as UFED or Oxygen can be used, neither of which is aimed at the home user.
Schrödinger’s backups
The one problem of recovering deleted records (be it messages, call logs or contacts) is the volatile nature of SQLite databases in modern versions of iOS. The only easy way to obtain SQLite databases from the device is making an iTunes backup. Until you make the backup, the databases are used with unmerged WAL (write-ahead logs), and some unmerged deleted records may still be recoverable. However, the very moment you initiate the backup, the SQLite databases are merged, and the deleted records are lost forever.
There is a single exception to this rule: the media files database one can obtain via the AFC protocol. These databases contain metadata for all indexed images and video files, including those the user deleted (and subsequently cleaned from the Recently Deleted album). However, there is very little value in image metadata for all but the forensic crowd.
Which leaves the “recovery” possibilities to restoring the data from an old (existing) backup. If you have a habit of making iTunes backups regularly… okay, nobody does, skip that.
If you have an existing iCloud backup containing the data that you’ve deleted after making the backup, you may be able to download that backup (we only know one tool that can and does, even if your account is protected with two-factor authentication; that’ Elcomsoft Phone Breaker). Note, however, that if you enabled “Messages in iCloud”, the messages will not be part of the iCloud backup anymore; instead, they’ll be synced with the cloud. “Messages in iCloud” are protected with end-to-end encryption; at this time, Elcomsoft Phone Breaker remains the only tool that can access end-to-end encrypted data in iCloud.
The clones
Just a quick note: the iOS recovery tools have become so popular that many of them are the same “white label” thing offered under a plethora of different labels. I would stay away of such tools as many of these so-called “manufacturers” will be unable to deliver the expected level of technical support should you need one.
Conclusion
With too many ambiguous claims, it is hard to trust the many iOS data recovery tools. Understanding the basic principles of their operation as well as the sources of the data used by such tools is important for adjusting one’s expectations. The absolute majority of data iOS recovery tools are based exclusively on the iOS/iTunes backup mechanism and the separate media synchronization protocol. Few tools can obtain synchronized information (such as the contacts, notes and calendars) from iCloud, and even fewer can download iCloud backups. We are yet to see an iOS data recovery tool that could pull an iCloud backup from a 2FA-protected account.
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An iPhone has great storage capacity. You can store data on your iPhone devices such as images, documents, and videos. Sometimes, many unpredicted incidents like accidental deletion happen with your iPhone which will lead to data loss. Here are the 11 best iPhone Data Recovery software you can free download to restore your lost or deleted data.
#1 iBeesoft iPhone Data Recovery
iBeesoft iPhone Data Recovery, the best and most efficient free iPhone recovery software. It offers you 3 ways to recover deleted and lost data on iPhone, namely, recover from iPhone directly, extract files from iTunes, and iCloud backup files. It fully recovers all lost data from your iPhone under all kinds of file loss scenarios. The iPhone data recovery free tool supports ranging from iPhone 4 to iPhone 12. Here are its salient features:
Your Best Free iPhone Recovery Software
- It can recover permanently deleted photos, videos, text messages, contacts, and more from iPhone
- 3 recovery modes available: recover from iOS, recover from iTunes, and recover from iCloud to ensure the successful iPhone data recovery rate.
- The best iPhone recovery software full version can fully compatible with all the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch models. leading-edge technology to make iOS recovery efficiently
#2 Stellar Phoenix
Stellar Phoenix recovery software is one of the ideal iPhone data recovery software. It has a potential to retrieve any kind of lost data from your iPhone device. It can also recover the messages of the social media apps such as Whatsapp. You can also use it without having any technical Knowledge.
Features:
- It helps to retrieve your deleted contacts, images, important documents, videos, and messages.
- The free iPhone restore software has a capability to do the deep scanning. With deep scan feature, you can recover old deleted photos iPhone
- If by accidentally you deleted backup files from iCloud or iTunes, then you can also retrieve backup files with the use of Stellar Phoenix.
Supported Operating System:
- It supported both Windows and Mac version
- All version of iPhone device.
Pros:
- Advanced Scanning feature.
- Recovery from any kind of iPhone device
- It directly saves the retrieved data to computer or iPhone device.
Cons:
- Its beta version does not offer the option to save the retrieved files.
#3 Primo
Primo free iPhone data recovery software has a flexible interface that provides easy navigable options. Apart from recovery option, it also fixes many issues of iPhone device such as a crash and upgrades error.
Features:
- It can retrieve 25 types of data.
- This free iOS recovery software will directly retrieve the lost content to your iPhone devices like images, documents, and messages.
- It recovers content from three secure modes.
Supported Operating System:
- It supports both Mac and Window.
- It also supports all latest iPhone version such as iPhone 12 and iPhone 11
- It also supports iPad and iPod series.
Pros:
- It provides a user-friendly interface.
- It provides an option for selective recovery.
Cons:
- It is not compatible with some social media apps like Viber and Snapchat.
- Its beta version does not offer the option to save the retrieved files.
#4 Dr.fone
Dr.fone is also very good iPhone restore software free and is preferred by many people to recover old pictures on iPhone. It automatically starts its processing when you connect your device with a computer.
Features:
- Preview lost content before retrieving.
- It can recover all kind of lost content from your iPhone device.
Supported Operating System:
- It supports all Microsoft Window version.
- The free iPhone recovery software also supports all Mac version up to 10.13 and latest iPhone version.
- It supports old iPhone version up to iPhone 5.
Pros:
- Its recovery speed is very fast.
- The interface of the software is very convenient to use.
Cons:
- Its free version does not provide an option to save any data.
#5 Syncios
It is another live saver tool for your lost data. It works similar to Primo data recovery software. When you lost your data, you think how to recover deleted photos on iPhone free. This free iPhone data recovery software can help you a lot.
Features:
- You can preview your lost content before recovering process.
- It can free iPhone data recovery without backup.
Supported Operating System:
- It supports all latest and old version of iPhone devices.
- It is also compatible with windows.
Pros:
- It can retrieve data under many difficult circumstances such as iPhone get crashed or broken.
- It can recover old iPhone photos.
Cons:
- It does not have an option for deep scanning.
#6 iMobie PhoneRescue
The PhoneResce free data recovery software for iPhone is secure software and provided an extraordinary result. Its convenient interface helps to retrieve iPhone data very easily.
Features:
- It can recover a wide range of lost data.
- It also provides repair feature for iPhone.
Supported Operating System:
- The iPhone recovery free APP supports all latest and old version of iPhone devices.
- It is also compatible with windows and android devices.
Pros:
- It is very simple to use.
- Messages are stored in HTML format.
Cons:
- It takes maximum time for scanning.
- Sometimes, it does not retrieve videos.
#7 EaseUs MobiSaver
The EaseUs MobiSaver is very latest iPhone free data recovery software and it can retrieve images, videos, documents and messages attachments.
Features:
- It can recover many types of data loss.
- You can preview data before retrieving
- It has a capability to do Automatic Recovery.
Supported Operating System:
- It supports all latest and old version of iPhone devices.
- It supports Windows and Mac versions.
Pros:
- Simple to use.
Cons:
- Slow scanning
- Sometimes, recovery problem occurs.
#8 Leawo
The Leawo iPhone data recovery software has the ability to recover very limited data. So, if you are seeking for data retrieving software which does not perform deep scanning. Then, Leawo is best for you.
Features:
Iphone Data Recovery
- It has a simple interface.
- It provides an option to preview data before retrieving.
Supported Operating System:
- It supports all version of iPhone devices.
- The free iPhone data recovery program is compatible with Windows as well as Mac versions.
Pros:
Iphone Data Recovery Cost
- It is convenient to use.
- Its installation is easy.
Cons:
- It has limited data recovering options.
#9 Aiseesoft Fonelab
The Aiseesoft Fnoelab has the easy navigable option. Its recovering capabilities are great. Its free iPhone photo recovery feature is very fast.
Features:
- It has a simple interface.
- 19 types of data can be recovered from your iPhone device
Supported Operating System:
- It supports latest iPhone devices. and old version up to iPhone 4.
- It is also compatible with Windows and Mac versions.
Pros:
- Its usage is easy.
Cons:
- Its beta version does not retrieve the content properly.
#10 Tenorshare iPhone Data Recovery
The Tenorshare iPhone Data Recovery is a reliable one. It is also one of the ideal iPhone recovery software to recover content lost from your iPhone device.
Iphone Data Recovery Service Near Me
Features:
- Before retrieving, you can preview your data
- 25 kinds of lost data can be recover.
Supported Operating System:
- It supports latest iPhone devices.
- It supports Windows and Mac versions.
Pros:
- It can retrieve large files.
- The free iPhone recovery software provides support for selective content recovery.
Cons:
- Its scanning time is very low.
- It does not retrieve the data properly
#11 Engima
The Engima is a very helpful tool to retrieve data and it provides full security while recovering. It is the last but the least iPhone Data Recovery Free Software Free.
Features:
- You can export data in different formats.
- You can retrieve a large number of deleted files.
Supported Operating System:
- It supports latest iPhone devices and old version up to iPhone 4.
- It supports Windows and Mac.
Pros:
- It has a simple interface
Iphone Data Recovery Program
Cons:
- Its scanning speed is very low.
Iphone Data Recovery Tool
You can download the above mentioned iPhone data recovery freely. If you stop using your iPhone right after you realize you have lost data, then the chance to recover data from your iPhone is big. And it is a good habit to back up your iPhone regularly. Whenever you lost data from your iPhone, you can restore the backup file or extract files from the backup package.
Tenorshare Iphone Data Recovery
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