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USB "Condom" Allows You To Practice Safe Charging

Posted by samzenpus on from the plugging-it-in dept.

MojoKid writes "Yep, a USB condom. That term is mostly a dose of marketing brilliance, which is to say that grabs your attention while also serving as an apt description of the product. A little company called int3.cc has developed a product—a USB condom—that blocks the data pins in your USB device while leaving the power pins free. Thus, any time you need to plug a device such as a smartphones into a USB port to charge it—let's say at a public charging kiosk or a coworker's computer--you don't have to worry about compromising any data or contracting some nasty malware. It's one of those simple solutions that seems so obvious once someone came up with it."

3 of 208 comments (clear)

  1. *yawn* these have around for years? by PhrostyMcByte · · Score: 5, Interesting

    My MP3 player, the nearly 10 years old Cowon D2, actually came with a power-only USB cable. Maybe their goal was to save money on copper.

    1. Re:*yawn* these have around for years? by tjohns · · Score: 5, Interesting

      If you plug your power-only USB cable into a modern charger, you'll find that your phone charges quite a bit slower than you'd expect. Modern chargers use the data pins to negotiate whether a charger supports higher currents.

      You don't want a phone to try drawing 2A from a charger that's only designed for 500mA.

  2. Not the only one out there by ericfitz · · Score: 5, Interesting

    There's a current KickStarter project called LockedUSB which does something similar, but which also includes a power management chip in order to negotiate higher power charging levels that normally require data connectivity. LockedUSB doesn't appear as big or ugly as the one in TFA. (Full disclosure: I'm a backer)