If you're in a law firm or corporate legal department, think about your current pending litigation. Now, think about how many of those cases could potentially utilize forensic analysis for collecting data. Jason Fry, senior forensics specialist at the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC), said he and his colleagues in government all agree on the answer: right near 100 percent.

“Everyone has a phone, everyone has something. … It's really starting to reach into every action that we do,” Fry explained.

So the data is out there. But then comes the second, and most important question: Should you actually use forensics in a certain case? That answer is trickier, and it requires a careful examination of the answer a lawyer intends to solve, the types of data involved, and, increasingly, proportionality concerns and whether a case is actually worth the time and monetary cost.