As more and more people demand mobile computing, the need for thumb drives (and, as an extension, external hard drives) would need to be used, which in turn would call for an ever increasing need for security. The more dependent you are on these thumb drives to store and transfer data, the more the importance of security scales up. How then, should thumb drive security be attained? Here are 4 simple, practical steps:
Chain them to yourself: A study reported that about 60% of people who own thumb drives lose their USB sticks sooner or later. Lost thumb drive cases are more than data breach cases. The evidence of data loss due to loss of these thumb drives is staggering. It is a mere act of negligence or theft, and it has really simple solutions. The best solution is to use one of those lanyard strings that come attached with USB sticks and tie them with something you might rarely lose, like your watch or something else.
Thumb-drive as a portable computer? Don't forget the basics like Anti-virus: Most people think that anti-virus packages earn their place only on computer systems. Increased mobility and the advent of mobile computing has spurred the need for making the storage space within a thumb drive akin to that of a normal computer. Small programs are scaled down in size and installed on your thumb drive such that it acts like a little computer when connected to any computer with a USB port. If that's the case, you got to have an anti-virus package installed on your thumb-drive. Since your drive changes host computers, it is all the more important to have one in place.
Without encryption, data on thumb drive is public property: Anti-virus can protect against viruses, but what about theft? What if someone wants to take a look at confidential data you have on your thumb drive? That's where encryption comes into play. Using encryption methods, all the data on your drive is “scrambled” rendering it useless to anyone who doesn't have a password to “unscramble” it. Almost all modern thumb drives do come with this software so please ensure that you use it at all times.
Back-up is mandated: Any data that is being transferred on to your thumb drive has to have a copy somewhere permanent – and multiple copies of that. In case you lose your thumb drive you must be able to access your data from any one of these multiple sources of storage. One easy way to have a multi-pronged approach for data back-up is to make multiple copies of the files/folders and have an automated online-back up service like Carbonite take care of it automatically, while you make copies and burn them on a CD notwithstanding the default/original copies on the computer's hard drive.