A simple time-dependent USB stick. It simply looses it's contents in xx hrs.
Yes, brilliant. No scratching DVD's.
There is a internal "timer" capacitor which can be charged to a particular voltage, higher the voltage the longer the delay until death of the USB drive. The cap has a resistor across it which creates the discharge time. The discharge resistor is only active when the USB is being accessed.
If you want the USB to die in 24 hours, the "timer" cap gets charged by the KIOSK to a set voltage level which means the "timer" cap will discharge completely in 24 hours and trigger a kill signal to the contents of the memory.
So how do we take a normal USB drive and add the "timer" cap?
And how do we keep a hacker from keeping the "timer" cap alive?
One last pitch here before the final decision is made if I may;
If we stick to original thought of the product idea this product is unique to the marketplace.
The potentials could be;
-Patentable, I have searched and nothing like this exists. The rewards have a large upsides.
-Security is huge, if marketed correctly to large corporations and or government agencies this could mean tremendous sales numbers, if a drive can be locked when you are not close to it has large security implications.
-New ideas for the USB Drive Market sell, if I had a choice when I walked into a store to purchase a drive that locked if I was not in the vicinity of it I would buy it in an instant, no question.
@Chris dropbox requires an internet connection and very fast upload if you are using larger files. It is not as effective as a USB drive in those circumstances.
I think RFID is too expensive. Bluetooth would probably work fine. As mentioned there is a built in 30 foot range and you could have an autorun program on the stick activate a bluetooth install that would be the "alarm" program. I agree it should pair with your cell phone, but that invlves too much setup for most users. I work with a lot of MDs, JDs, PhD's and the like and I am here to tell you they can not program a phone AND a usb device. They just can't do it. So they won't and then where's your security? Also, BT would surely up the cost of USB devices who wants to pay more for 4gb or 16gb or whatever. People shop GB to $$ for the most part, and features come last.
I think security for your USB should be time dependent and rely on the honesty of the computer user that has acquired the stick. However honesty alone will not work as I have pocketed many USB sticks in my work. Here is my plan for a good device.
We've all seen the U3 crappy software. No? Well look it up. The second search suggestion after U3 software is "U3 removal tool". It makes everything take longer and is a bit annoying. However the secure password protected USB drives, well those people get the point of and aren't as annoyed by. They serve a much more serious purpose.
I propose you add a time limit box where you enter a 5 or 30 or 60 for the amount of minutes you intend to keep the drive in for. Then you add to that type of software by creating an always on top popup that says very discretely over the taskbar who's USB drive is in the machine with a name, number, email address and message ("This drive contains sensitive material, erasing, destroying, or illegally acquiring the information or hardware will result in prosecution"). Then you could add an autosend email to the owner after the time period using their default email program. You could always build in a link to a website that autosends an email as well giving you the IP (location) and computer name, etc. from the useragent data available in almost all browsers. And lastly I think this information could also be sent via web to text to the predetermined cell phone number.
One of the main benifits of this system is that the owner of the USB would only have to initially enter in their name, number, and email. Then they would have to type in only the minutes until the "alarm" goes off on first use. Pretty simple.
I would bet this software solution would be more effective and less expensive than a BT, RFID, speaker, battery dependent method or any other hardware solution. When you sell it just make it seem like this "comes with" the device and people will think it's hardware based. Additionally this could be licensed to any other USB manufacturer. Just get the software right and maybe you could sell it to them for cheap enough to justify the profit sharing.
As for caps. I hate caps. I like retractile USB sticks or ones that are attached permanently through a cord or something like that.
I would make this a key like device that would attach to your keyring with a retractable pull string inside http://bit.ly/7UDbtB and have the little usb chip http://bit.ly/7qL5A4 come out much simpler solution and cheaper. Could be the slip stick II if you add two usb chips and add the beamer led as a mini flashlight should be easy to get the same manufacture to make this.
Tried it, 2 gig limit for free if you need more it's really expensive. Many secure networks do not allow access to remote file storage such ad Dropbox. Portable storage media is a very effective place to store data, cloud data has it's place but it also has it's limits.
Thinking of Rob Penn's idea with the phone, the OS could do the alarm by alerting your phone when the computer has not been in use for a few minutes. This could be in the form of a text message or a call.
I think we should think about the situations in which the drive would be left inserted in the computer: after turning off the computer, walking away from the computer for a few minutes, etc. Instead of physically having something with a sort of alarm on the drive, there could be software on the drive that causes the OS to alert you on the desktop or something that you still have the drive in. The alert could happen if the computer sees that it is being shutdown with the drive still in the computer for example.
If that wouldn't work out, I also like Rob Penn's idea about using a phone as the alert mechanism.
Comments
A simple time-dependent USB stick. It simply looses it's contents in xx hrs.
Yes, brilliant. No scratching DVD's.
There is a internal "timer" capacitor which can be charged to a particular voltage, higher the voltage the longer the delay until death of the USB drive. The cap has a resistor across it which creates the discharge time. The discharge resistor is only active when the USB is being accessed.
If you want the USB to die in 24 hours, the "timer" cap gets charged by the KIOSK to a set voltage level which means the "timer" cap will discharge completely in 24 hours and trigger a kill signal to the contents of the memory.
So how do we take a normal USB drive and add the "timer" cap?
And how do we keep a hacker from keeping the "timer" cap alive?
One last pitch here before the final decision is made if I may;
If we stick to original thought of the product idea this product is unique to the marketplace.
The potentials could be;
-Patentable, I have searched and nothing like this exists. The rewards have a large upsides.
-Security is huge, if marketed correctly to large corporations and or government agencies this could mean tremendous sales numbers, if a drive can be locked when you are not close to it has large security implications.
-New ideas for the USB Drive Market sell, if I had a choice when I walked into a store to purchase a drive that locked if I was not in the vicinity of it I would buy it in an instant, no question.
This idea is unique and attainable.
@Chris dropbox requires an internet connection and very fast upload if you are using larger files. It is not as effective as a USB drive in those circumstances.
I think RFID is too expensive. Bluetooth would probably work fine. As mentioned there is a built in 30 foot range and you could have an autorun program on the stick activate a bluetooth install that would be the "alarm" program. I agree it should pair with your cell phone, but that invlves too much setup for most users. I work with a lot of MDs, JDs, PhD's and the like and I am here to tell you they can not program a phone AND a usb device. They just can't do it. So they won't and then where's your security? Also, BT would surely up the cost of USB devices who wants to pay more for 4gb or 16gb or whatever. People shop GB to $$ for the most part, and features come last.
I think security for your USB should be time dependent and rely on the honesty of the computer user that has acquired the stick. However honesty alone will not work as I have pocketed many USB sticks in my work. Here is my plan for a good device.
We've all seen the U3 crappy software. No? Well look it up. The second search suggestion after U3 software is "U3 removal tool". It makes everything take longer and is a bit annoying. However the secure password protected USB drives, well those people get the point of and aren't as annoyed by. They serve a much more serious purpose.
I propose you add a time limit box where you enter a 5 or 30 or 60 for the amount of minutes you intend to keep the drive in for. Then you add to that type of software by creating an always on top popup that says very discretely over the taskbar who's USB drive is in the machine with a name, number, email address and message ("This drive contains sensitive material, erasing, destroying, or illegally acquiring the information or hardware will result in prosecution"). Then you could add an autosend email to the owner after the time period using their default email program. You could always build in a link to a website that autosends an email as well giving you the IP (location) and computer name, etc. from the useragent data available in almost all browsers. And lastly I think this information could also be sent via web to text to the predetermined cell phone number.
One of the main benifits of this system is that the owner of the USB would only have to initially enter in their name, number, and email. Then they would have to type in only the minutes until the "alarm" goes off on first use. Pretty simple.
I would bet this software solution would be more effective and less expensive than a BT, RFID, speaker, battery dependent method or any other hardware solution. When you sell it just make it seem like this "comes with" the device and people will think it's hardware based. Additionally this could be licensed to any other USB manufacturer. Just get the software right and maybe you could sell it to them for cheap enough to justify the profit sharing.
As for caps. I hate caps. I like retractile USB sticks or ones that are attached permanently through a cord or something like that.
I would make this a key like device that would attach to your keyring with a retractable pull string inside http://bit.ly/7UDbtB and have the little usb chip http://bit.ly/7qL5A4 come out much simpler solution and cheaper. Could be the slip stick II if you add two usb chips and add the beamer led as a mini flashlight should be easy to get the same manufacture to make this.
Tried it, 2 gig limit for free if you need more it's really expensive. Many secure networks do not allow access to remote file storage such ad Dropbox. Portable storage media is a very effective place to store data, cloud data has it's place but it also has it's limits.
Why not just use:
www.dropbox.com
for free...
^^following above comment
Thinking of Rob Penn's idea with the phone, the OS could do the alarm by alerting your phone when the computer has not been in use for a few minutes. This could be in the form of a text message or a call.
I think we should think about the situations in which the drive would be left inserted in the computer: after turning off the computer, walking away from the computer for a few minutes, etc. Instead of physically having something with a sort of alarm on the drive, there could be software on the drive that causes the OS to alert you on the desktop or something that you still have the drive in. The alert could happen if the computer sees that it is being shutdown with the drive still in the computer for example.
If that wouldn't work out, I also like Rob Penn's idea about using a phone as the alert mechanism.
The sensor could be in your watch or another wristband. I think it could be activated just by sticking a small RFID to the flash drive.
If you can make it very minimal. Extremely small and unobtrusive like the Pico thumb drives then I can see the product sell even more!
Viewing: 1-10 of 60
Show All