Authorities hope Fitbit can help find missing Iowa college student Mollie Tibbetts

Investigators in Iowa are hoping a missing 20-year-old college student's Fitbit will provide clues about her disappearance.

Mollie Tibbetts was last seen in her hometown of Brooklyn on July 18, but authorities believe they have "put together a pretty solid timeline" of what she was doing before she vanished, according to Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation spokesman Mitch Mortvedt.

He would not details of those activities, citing the active investigation.

"We wish it could go faster, too," Mortvedt said. "As you can imagine, it can be massive amounts of data we're going through."

The FBI and other agencies have issued search warrants to fitness tracking companies, including Fitbit. Loved ones say Tibbetts, who went running on the night she disappeared, wore a Fitbit.

"This is a new arena for us," Mortvedt tells CNN. "That's part of the reason we called the FBI in. It's probably pretty new to them, too. I don't know of another case here in Iowa where we have used specifically Fitbit info."

Authorities are also looking into social media accounts and checking cellphone records.

Tibbetts' boyfriend said he received a Snapchat message from her after she returned from her run. She had been watching Dalton Jack's dogs because he had a construction job 100 miles away.

Mortvedt said that the possibility grows with each passing day that she was taken against her will, and that investigators "haven't ruled anything out."

"We’re checking gas stations and convenience stores and any location with easy access to a highway or the interstate,” Mortvedt told the Gazette. “We’re asking questions and collecting surveillance footage and check it to see if Mollie was caught on camera or if there was someone in the area acting suspicious.”

• With News Wire Services