USB Security Software: Protecting Your Flash USB Drive
USB Security Software: Protecting Your Flash USB Drive
If you use a flash USB drive then you should strong consider using USB security software to protect the data on it. USB drives are great for transferring information easily between computers without having to worry about uploading a file to somewhere on the web or in the "cloud" and then retrieve it on a different PC. But they're easy to mislay or for other people to borrow - intentionally or otherwise.
Protecting your data with some form of USB security software makes sense. The software is cheap - about the cost of a single decent sized USB stick - and will protect the contents of as many USB drives as you need it to.
The encryption standards of modern USB security software are high. You can set the key length to make it so that even the most powerful computer system would struggle to decipher your software protection key in this lifetime. But you have access to your files whenever you want at the tap of a few keystrokes.
So what should you look for in USB security software?
First you need to make sure that the software is easy to use. Otherwise you will decide against using the program and that defeats the idea of protecting your USB pen drive. Ideally, the software should be completely intuitive so that you don't have to resort to the help file to use it. Hmmm - Nokia should take note of that idea when they next write their phone software suite. Sorry, I digressed.
Next, you need to make sure that the software does what it claims to do. There's no point in using your USB security software if a teenager could hack around it. Spend a couple of minutes seeing if you can read the allegedly password protected files or folders without too much trouble.
Near enough any USB security software should protect your files and folders in the Windows environment. But what happens if you allow your inner geek to come to the surface and go out to the command prompt? Does the protection still work or was the programmer being lazy?
Once your USB security software has passed those tests, it's time to start password protecting your flash USB drives.
If you're organised, you can protect all of them as soon as you've downloaded the software. This is probably the best way as it means you'll remember whilst your mind is fresh.
If you're a bit more scatter brained then you'll need to remember to load up the USB security software each time you transfer files to a USB drive.
Your choice.
Just remember to do it, otherwise your USB security software won't be able to do its job.