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IBM Bans Staff From Using Removable Storage Devices (theregister.co.uk)

Posted by msmash on from the in-the-meanwhile dept.

An anonymous reader shares a report: In an advisory to employees, IBM global chief Information security officer Shamla Naidoo said the company "is expanding the practise of prohibiting data transfer to all removable portable storage devices (eg: USB, SD card, flash drive)." The advisory stated some pockets of IBM have had this policy for a while, but "over the next few weeks we are implementing this policy worldwide." Big Blue's doing this because "the possible financial and reputational damage from misplaced, lost or misused removable portable storage devices must be minimised." IBMers are advised to use Big Blue's preferred sync 'n' share service to move data around.

5 of 167 comments (clear)

  1. Lost Productivity by zmaragdus · · Score: 4, Interesting

    But how much productivity is lost because I need to use my personal laptop to transfer screenshots from a spectrum analyzer (USB port only!) via emailing to myself? My company does basically the same thing, and as an electronics engineer that spends a bunch of time at a test bench, this SUCKS!

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    1. Re:Lost Productivity by PA23 · · Score: 4, Interesting

      My company does similar. When we insert a USB thumb drive the system will prompt you to encrypt the drive, the encryption locks it to your machine only. If you say "Don't encrypt" then you are limited to Read only on the device, this is so we can download data from a client.

      At least our company has a procedure for obtaining an exception to the encrypted usb drive rule if you can justify it.

    2. Re:Lost Productivity by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Just use your phone as the USB drive. I work for a fortune 500 that uses the exact same technology and after asking one of the security analysts how it works, I quickly realized it would not recognize my phone as a removable storage device (it works based off the driver ID's used to interface with the device and thumb drives use a different driver than phones do.) I'm able to transfer files freely to my phone without issue.

  2. I guess nobody told them by bobstreo · · Score: 3, Interesting

    about wi-fi enabled portable hard drives and NFS or Samba shares. or FUSE or SSHFS.

  3. In other news, IBM enters the 21st century... by gosand · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I've worked for a couple of very large financial institutions, and they disabled USB drives 5+ years ago. It not only curtails the threat of pilfering information, but shuts down a hole in security. "hey, I found this thumb drive in the parking lot, I'll just plug it in and see what's on it"

    It was a pain at first, but you quickly learn that for MOST work, it's not necessary. If it is, you can usually get an exemption.

    I am surprised this made the "news" though.

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