Seagate recently launched two portable drives with very different personalities. Why? One size no longer fits all. But which drive is right for you?
Seagate FreeAgent Go - a great personal drive. It’s the thinnest portable drive in the world, with up to 500 GB and a desktop dock.
I use the FreeAgent Go for my personal data. I can drop the Go into a dock at work and easily use the files on my work PC. I don’t have to mix my personal and work content, but have access to both.
Maxtor BlackArmor – a great business drive. It’s the safest drive in the world, with government-grade 128-bit AES encryption and up to 320 GB.
I use the BlackArmor for backing up my work files. I keep it at home as a simple disaster recovery scheme. There is absolutely no risk of anyone accessing the data without the password, even if it were to fall out of my bag at a hacker’s convention.
Solving the “data on the loose” problem starts with safer loose data
Despite an almost daily cadence of news stories about exposed customer data, most IT departments seem resigned to the fact that their number might be called. It’s just fate, right? What are they supposed to do – ban thumb drives? Restrict notebook PCs to the office?
New products from Dell, Seagate and others are finally providing realistic solutions. For a small premium to standard notebooks and mobile storage devices, companies can now make their employees data loss-proof with self-encrypted disk drive technology like Seagate’s Seagate Secure.
Blesssed by the NSA
These notebooks and portable drives can still be lost or stolen, but the data is 100% protected with government-grade 128-bit AES encryption. The incident remains an inconvenient hassle rather than a newspaper headline.
Unlike software solutions, the disk drives in these products are encrypted automatically so employees can’t turn it off or forget to turn it on. There is no performance penalty. Laptop passwords can be centrally managed with McAfee’s ePolicy Orchestrator and other vendors’ products.
While mobile encryption doesn’t plug every hole in your defenses (malicious or misguided workers, for instance), it does provide a foundation of security that you can build upon.
Let’s hear from users (or panners) of this technology – what do you think?
My first blog post a year ago was about my full drive on my work PC. Since then I’ve expanded to 100 gigabytes. Nothing like my home PC, but work space requirements tend to be lower.
I’m in the midst of changing my backup method from a local desktop backup drive to a BlackArmor portable drive. It allows me to backup my work remotely. It’s got Seagate Secure technology, which means it’s hackproof – no worries about losing sensitive information.
I expect my next laptop to have a Seagate Secure encrypted drive inside as well.
Someday it will be considered stupid – and maybe illegal – to use a hard drive that’s not self-encrypting in a business PC.
Take the Oops factor out of the security equation with mobile encryption
The UK government’s data security woes continue, the latest a misplaced USB stick containing detailed data on 10,000 serious offenders -and all 84,000 prisoners in England. Home Secretary Jacqui Smith, in charge of UK prisons, is the Embarrassed Minister of the Month when it comes to UK data security.
Of course there will be lots of hand-wringing about this persistent trend. The reality is that while processes can be improved, people will be people; stuff happens.
Encryption makes lost drives no-news events
Mandate fully encrypted mobile storage like Seagate BlackArmor and the UK government will at least “oops” proof data on the move.
Interesting comments in the post on how much cooler it would be if it didn’t need an external power suppy. That’s the trade-off between tinkerable boxes like this and a ready-to-use storage product like Seagate’s BlackArmor. Just like home construction projects, the last 10% of “finish” can really make a difference in portable storage.
It all depends on who you are and what you need.
I could see Addonics’ Portable Dual Drive enclosure as a great starting point for a kick-butt specialized solution from a system builder.
Cool, but encryption is a kindler and gentler way to retire disk drives
Blocks and Files highlighted this very physical solution to a data management problem: how to be sure sensitive data on retired disk drives never again sees the light of day. It’s a do-it-yourself version of industrial disk crushers.
Verity’s quite excited about the Hard Drive Destroyer, and I know it fills a desperate need. But it’s not very resource-efficient nor environmentally friendly. That’s a perfectly good drive! Can’t someone else use it?
The renewable alternative: self-encrypting hard drives like the Momentus FDE and BlackArmor. When it’s time to retire, throw away the AES-grade encryption key, and Poof! - what was once written will never be seen again. Certifiably so.
Momentus FDE is a notebook drive. The first enterprise FDE drive will be the Seagate Cheetah 15K . Stay tuned.
Who’s destroying drives out there? Anyone willing to admit they’re ignoring this problem and reusing drives?
iosafe disk drives keep data safe in a fire or flood.
How good of a bank vault is your solution?
It’s a new way to think about what you do for your customers. You are processing and storing your customer’s liquid assets. Your solutions need to reflect that reality, or you may end up having to help them recover from a nasty surprise.
An alternative to “Old School” bank vaults and security guards for data is encryption. Seagate’s Maxtor BlackArmor drives are better than a loaded gun in keep thieves out of your stuff. Without the password, NO ONE can get to your data. Period.
Who’s had data irretrievably lost or stolen? How did you recover?
Going by today’s headlines, storage vendors should add a new spec to their data sheets: hackability.
Case in point: yet another theft of reams of customer data, this time in the UK. Tapes left in a car.
Wired Magazine’s Fetish spread features the Maxtor BlackArmor drive from Seagate. This is a new kind of extreme storage device. It’s virtually unhackackable, offering AES encryption encased within the hard drive itself. So if it gets stolen or lost (does it matter which?), you can sleep secure in the fact that someone else may have your drive, but they don’t have your data.
It’s got a high “eye candy” factor, too – so you can be safe AND cool.
Seagate announced its new Maxtor BlackArmor secure portable drive today. 160GB, full AES encryption. Everything stored on this puppy is automatically encrypted and virtually hack-proof.
Seagate’s taken a leading position in truly secure storage devices. This drive follows the already-released Momentus FDE secure notebook drive.
This is an easy add-on solution for desktop or notebook customers. Worry-free mobile storage!
