Comments on: Password protect my thumbdrive?

Question: Password protect my thumbdrive?

celibate_life — Tue, 17 May 2005 15:26:42 -0800

Does anyone know a simple (and free) method of password-protecting my USB thumbdrive?

By: autojack

autojack — Tue, 17 May 2005 15:30:36 -0800

PGP? That's what I'd use. Just encrypt the files.

By: riffola

riffola — Tue, 17 May 2005 15:32:36 -0800

AxCrypt is good for encrypting on a computer and decrypting off the drive itself.

By: nixxon

nixxon — Tue, 17 May 2005 15:49:41 -0800

Truecrypt is good, but Windows only. I have a small (2MB) unencrypted partition for the program on my USB drive, and have all my data on an encrypted partition that takes up the rest of the drive space.

By: Jairus

Jairus — Tue, 17 May 2005 15:59:09 -0800

Seconding TrueCrypt or some PGP implementation.

By: celibate_life

celibate_life — Tue, 17 May 2005 16:32:36 -0800

Is there anything simpler than this (I'm kinda scared of partitioning, formatting, etc.)? I don't need this to be very secure at all. I just don't want the average joe to pick up my USB drive and be able to look through all my information. Ideally it would go something like this:
1 Insert flash drive
2 password prompt
3 enter correct password
4 see all files.

Maybe a tiny program I could keep on the drive itself?

By: RichardP

RichardP — Tue, 17 May 2005 16:44:52 -0800

What OS are you using? If you use Mac OS X you can use the OS utility Disk Copy to create an encrypted disk image on the USB flash drive. To use it just, 1) insert flash drive, 2) double-click disk image, 3) enter password, 4) a new volume will show up on the desktop containing all the current files as well as allow you to add and delete files.

By: krisjohn

krisjohn — Tue, 17 May 2005 20:28:35 -0800

Do you already own a thumbdrive? Some have security stuff bundled with them. I believe my Swissbit drive that's part of my little Swiss Army Knife came with such a tool. Older drives did it in hardware, but that means you have to install drivers. Newer drives tend to have a little utility on the drive when you get them.

By: skallas

skallas — Wed, 18 May 2005 00:59:58 -0800

A very simple solution is to use winzip's built-in encryption. Most windows machines have a copy of winzip on them and if they dont its a free download. In fact you can put the installer on your drive.

Create a folder called stuff, make it encrypted and put all your stuff in there. Joe off the street shouldnt be able to read it. Make sure to use the newest version of winzip with the new (AES) encryption.

When you double click the folder you'll be asked for a password. No fuss, no muss. When done, put the file back in there.

By: tr33hggr

tr33hggr — Wed, 18 May 2005 07:09:11 -0800

Awesome, I was just searching for a good solution for this.

A question (or two) about WinZip's encryption. Seems the method only encrypts individual files. Is there any way to encrypt the Zip file itself?

If not, do I need to encrypt each file I add to the Zip file as I add them? Or can I set it to encrypt all files added, regardless of when I add them?

By: celibate_life

celibate_life — Wed, 18 May 2005 08:54:21 -0800

Okay, cool...this definitely seems like the simplest method so far. However, it looks like this encrypts each file individually, so that I need to enter the password to open single files. Is there a way to encrypt a folder without encrypting its actual contents?

By: celibate_life

celibate_life — Wed, 18 May 2005 08:56:01 -0800

Oh...I completely misread tr33hggr's question. Looks like he already asked this.

By: tr33hggr

tr33hggr — Wed, 18 May 2005 12:46:15 -0800

*crickets*

By: noahv

noahv — Wed, 18 May 2005 14:43:41 -0800

Yes, WinZip (or WinRAR) will encrpyt files as they are added to a password protected archive.

Another possible solution is some of the bundled password protection software that comes with USB drives. The drive I got (EdgeTech DiskGo!) comes with some that you can download from their site (http://www.edgetechcorp.com/support/products/portable-drives/usb-flash-drive/style1-after-12-03.asp). Good luck.

By: tr33hggr

tr33hggr — Thu, 19 May 2005 05:55:49 -0800

Thanks!