USB drive

[feenberg]

I bought a USB thumb drive (Verbatim) with a "privacy zone", thinking
it would provide some modest protection for confidential data if the
device was lost. However, it seems to require an executable "v-safe
100.exe" to be installed on the hard drive. This seems very odd.
Furthermore, I am at a loss to understand just what it is doing -
encryption isn't mentioned in the manual, but niether is anything else
substantive about what is happening. The manual does say that
administrative rights are required on any computer used to access the
drive. Is that inevitable with a device like this? Can anyone suggest
an alternative that is a bit more transparent and portable? I was
hoping for something that could be plugged into any USB port and read,
but still required some password or similar to view the data. It
needn't be 128-bit or anything like that.

Daniel Feenberg
feenberg is at nber dotte org

 

[Arno Wagner]

I bought a USB thumb drive (Verbatim) with a "privacy zone", thinking
it would provide some modest protection for confidential data if the
device was lost. However, it seems to require an executable "v-safe
100.exe" to be installed on the hard drive. This seems very odd.
Furthermore, I am at a loss to understand just what it is doing -
encryption isn't mentioned in the manual, but niether is anything else
substantive about what is happening. The manual does say that
administrative rights are required on any computer used to access the
drive. Is that inevitable with a device like this?

No. But a non-software solution is going to be very expensive.

I would also strongly advise you to not trust this thing.

Can anyone suggest
an alternative that is a bit more transparent and portable? I was
hoping for something that could be plugged into any USB port and read,
but still required some password or similar to view the data. It
needn't be 128-bit or anything like that.

Daniel Feenberg
feenberg is at nber dotte org

Have a look at http://www.truecrypt.org/. Still software, but far more
trustworthy. I am not sure whether you have to install it on the computer,
but the way to do it would be to have the software on the USB key and
the confiential data in one large file there as well.

Arno

 

[rcross.unsw]

Hi,

I also just got a usb drive that has this v-zone 100 thing and was
looking for more details when i came across this post. I'm still trying
to figure out what the deal is with this software, but i do have some
suggestions for you. 1st, definitely check out truecrypt its is very
secure. However it requires admin privileges (or a previous install) so
that cuts down portability ALOT meaning if you want to use it in a
internet cafe or something its a no-go but if you want to use it on
your friends computer and they give you access its no prob. What might
be the easiest answer for you is to use something like 7-zip or another
encrypting compression program that you can have the exe on the usb. It
gets around the admin issues and basically provides you with a
passworded protection if you lost your drive. There are other
extenuating security issues involved (which is why truecrypt doesn't
have a working solution for a truly portable condition) basically, it
comes down to once you have extracted/decrypted your data pretty much
all security is lost due to potential compromises of the "guest" pc
like a keystroke logger or any reasonable data recovery software. Its
basically fairly hard to be sure that your file is really deleted from
where you put its decrypted data while you use it and if you can delete
it, there are still some traces in other parts of the OS that people
might be able to access it. So, generally speaking i think a passworded
7zip file works for most people, but still know that its not 100%
secure and you'll have to weigh that against how sensitive or important
your data is.

Good luck,
Ryan

 

[Art]

I bought a USB thumb drive (Verbatim) with a "privacy zone", thinking
it would provide some modest protection for confidential data if the
device was lost. However, it seems to require an executable "v-safe
100.exe" to be installed on the hard drive. This seems very odd.
Furthermore, I am at a loss to understand just what it is doing -
encryption isn't mentioned in the manual, but niether is anything else
substantive about what is happening. The manual does say that
administrative rights are required on any computer used to access the
drive. Is that inevitable with a device like this? Can anyone suggest
an alternative that is a bit more transparent and portable? I was
hoping for something that could be plugged into any USB port and read,
but still required some password or similar to view the data. It
needn't be 128-bit or anything like that.

Daniel Feenberg
feenberg is at nber dotte org

I have a San Disk Cruzer that has U3 security built-in. It works pretty
good and doesn't require anything to be installed on the hard drive.

This is the model I have:

http://www.sandisk.com/Products/Item(1925)-SDCZ6-4096-SanDisk_Cruzer_Micro_4GB_Black__New.aspx

Be advised that U3 security only works on Windows 2000 and XP OSs.

YMMV.

Art