Tuesday, July 13, 2004

The pocket-sized digital music player, which can store thousands of songs, is one of a series of banned gadgets that the military will no longer allow into most sections of its headquarters in the UK and abroad. Devices with large storage capabilities -- most notably those with a Universal Serial Bus (or USB) plug used to connect to a computer -- have been treated with greater suspicion of late by government agencies and corporations alike. [iPodlounge] iPod-sized storage with a fast connector will be getting smaller and smaller. In a few years, cell phones will have those capabilities. The military can try to ban all such devices, but corporations? The most idiotic aspect of this is of course that the problem is not in the iPod or other portable devices, it is in the desktop, which is designed with no attention to security, including absurdities like USB autorun. [Update: There have been some follow-ups that suggest the UK MoD is more discriminating than claimed in the original story. Obviously, all portable disk devices are a potential risk in high-security areas. But the main point still stands that the main risk is in the lack of security of desktop systems, which should not be configured in ways that allow wholesale dumping of confidential or classified data to external devices.] 2:09:30 PM