Slashdot Mirror
Crypto Leash for Laptops?
timman999 writes "New Scientist reports a new device that will automatically encrypt all the data on a laptop when it is separated from its owner. It uses a small receiver and the user has to wear a transmitter on his wrist."
Who gives a shit about the laptop, for personal use you might but corporate clients (the people who buy probably 95% of laptops) the data is worth way more than the laptop. For us losing a $3k laptop is nothing, when you buy $90k suns and making a new chip mask is $800k a $3k laptop is a drop in the budget bucket. Now the data and loss of proprietary info to competitors could be potential losses of hundreds of millions, that should kind of put things in perspective. If Bill Gates, John Chambers, Larry Elllison or any number of other other CEO's laptops were stolen the potential for blackmail or selling of corporate secrects could be in the billions.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
To just have an encrypted filesystem, and make the user type the password when it boots? Less points of failure, less expensive, and less trouble.
But that doesn't solve the problem that this is aimed to solve, which is either the laptop is stolen while on (and therefore decrypted) or the user walks away from the machine (leaving it decrypted).
As the article said, this could have a real application for people in busy semi-open areas (like a trading floor) who have to sometimes go away from their machines - even traders sometimes have to answer the call of nature or the boss.
This simply automates the encryption process once user and machine are separated by a specific physical distance. I particularly like the fact that it auto-decrypts when the user returns, although the potential exploits involving a detatched body part returning are rather disturbing...
Sailing over the event horizon
Why bother with the wristwatch? Scramdisk (free) and Drivecrypt (commercial) already do this in software, using strong passwords.
1. Use the software to encrypt your disk contents
2. To decrypt (on the fly), you need the password
3. Set your screensaver to lock, with a (different) password.
Voila. Done. Rebooting to get by the screen lock unmounts the drive, rendering it useless.
This is really, really easy. What's the big deal about all this gadgetry nonsense?
But that doesn't solve the problem that this is aimed to solve, which is either the laptop is stolen while on (and therefore decrypted) or the user walks away from the machine (leaving it decrypted).
Users are stupid.
How do you plan against the idiot who says, "I'm not wearing that stupid watch", takes it off and sets it next to the laptop? Or, in traditional user fashion, fastens it securely to the laptop?
At my last place of employment, we instituted strong password requirements. That didn't stop half the users from writing them on post-it notes and sticking them to their laptops. When caught, it was always, "Well you make me change it every 90 days! And you make me put NUMBERS in it! I can't remember that!"
"I can't wear that silly watch" will replace "I can't remember that" if this device is put into real world use.
-Ryan, with the unoriginal sig