Hard Drive Encryption at Your Fingertip

[Roger]

Here's more evidence for my theory that science fiction actually predicts the future. How many times in movies and TV shows have you seen a character accessing information only by proving his or her identity through a fingerprint scan?

Well, the LaCie Porsche SAFE Portable Drive with Encryption does just that. The external drive encrypts and protects your information and unlocks the data only after you provide your fingerprint. It's also protected by a firmware drive lock, meaning the HDD can't be taken out and used with another board, and it has a port for connecting a separately sold chain lock to help keep it from being stolen. It recognizes the fingerprints of up to five different users, with customizable access privileges for each
user: read only, read/write, and administration. It's both Mac and PC friendly, transfers data over USB 2.0, and comes in 80 GB and 120 GB models.

After you've registered your fingerprint on the drive's scanner, unlocking the drive and using it is just a matter of swiping your finger over the drive's sensor. If you need to step away from the drive for just a few minutes, you can lock it by swiping your finger over it again and unlock it the same way when you return. An LED at the top of the drive indicates red when locked, orange when identifying a fingerprint, and green when unlocked.

You will need to install the LaCie software on at least one computer so you can configure the fingerprint scanner. The scans themselves are encrypted and stored on the drive itself, so you can safely use the drive with other USB 2.0-compatible computers without installing any software.

If you're trying to protect sensitive intellectual property or financial information, it's always better to be safe than sorry.

--Posted by Porter B. Hall


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