Secure USB Drive Comes To OS X

There are plenty of USB thumb drives with native encryption, such as IronKey, available -- if you're a PC user. Today, SanDisk announced its secure USB flash drive that supports OS X. It's about time.

1 Min Read

There are plenty of USB thumb drives with native encryption, such as IronKey, available -- if you're a PC user. Today, SanDisk announced its secure USB flash drive that supports OS X. It's about time.Lost USB drives with sensitive data have grown to become a significant problem, recently. And there really hasn't been a viable USB-drive for the Mac armed with native crypto. That changed today with the new SanDisk Cruzer Enterprise, which comes in 1-, 2-, 4-, and 8-GB versions, and works with OS X 10.4 AND 10.5. It has hardware-based 256-bit AES encryption.

Also, from SanDisk's release:

"Cruzer Enterprise in Mac OS X and Windows PC environments has the same features and data security -- even if used in both environments. The device can be initialized from either a Macintosh or Windows computer, where users can:

* Log in and shut down access to the encrypted storage area * Change and manage passwords * Change contact information, language and other preferences * Launch online support, view current firmware and drive information

"

That makes it easier for security admins to manage the security of their flash drives, even in mixed OS environments.

According to IronKey's Web site, its Mac OS X encrypted personal USB flash drive is in beta.

About the Author(s)

George V. Hulme, Contributing Writer

An award winning writer and journalist, for more than 20 years George Hulme has written about business, technology, and IT security topics. He currently freelances for a wide range of publications, and is security blogger at InformationWeek.com.

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