Defense Department Partially Lifting Flash Drive Ban

[HardOCP News]

The year old ban on flash drives has been lifted at the Department of Defense but, only for some people. According to a top military official, a select group of authorized people will now be able to use approved flash drives for mission critical functions.

The important thing is to ensure that thumb drives used in the future cannot transfer viruses to military computers and networks, Carey said. A big part of that won't come from technology, but from limiting thumb drive use, training users to follow security practices and conducting compliance audits, he said.

 

[Impact9]

Guess comm is finally getting sick of the massive boost in email traffic since they stopped letting us store files on our personnel thumb drives. When they started this ban we'd have to email files to ourselves to use on different computers because they can't figure out how to create a folder for every single person on the network that is easily accessible. If you was lucky to have access to a shared drive the server url was too crazy and long to remember plus they are generally hidden. Ah well, retirement isn't far off.

 

[T4rd]

Guess comm is finally getting sick of the massive boost in email traffic since they stopped letting us store files on our personnel thumb drives. When they started this ban we'd have to email files to ourselves to use on different computers because they can't figure out how to create a folder for every single person on the network that is easily accessible. If you was lucky to have access to a shared drive the server url was too crazy and long to remember plus they are generally hidden. Ah well, retirement isn't far off.

This rule is semi-retarded anyways. Because they still allow us to use normal external HDs which function exactly the same from a PCs perspective. So their just as susceptible to the spread of malicious software as thumb drives are. I think the only reason they did this is because all of the lost/stolen thumb drives that occur while in-theater to alleviate the chances of sensitive/secret information being leaked to the local nationals and the enemy. This was happening all the time when I was there. You could go out to the local markets and see thumb drives with red "SECRET" sticers on them for sale for $5. But still, from what I saw while I was deployed, when you're out at an outpost and comms are spotty from crappy satellite links and your commander needs to get information (special powerpoint slides, hah) to another company commander at another outpost, he's going to take it on a thumb drive and there's no one there to enforce otherwise.

 

[DeathFromBelow]

I worked at a defense contractor where we weren't allowed to bring anything electronic into the building without having it checked out with security. Music CD's, calculators, anything.

Defense department security seems to be incompetent.

 

[Glimfeather]

There's more OPSEC violation on Facebook today than I ever had on my haji flash drive in '04.

 

[Azhar]

I worked at a defense contractor where we weren't allowed to bring anything electronic into the building without having it checked out with security. Music CD's, calculators, anything.

Defense department security seems to be incompetent.

Hell, my dad works for BP Amoco in Whiting, Indiana and they don't allow *anything* in their plant. I'm surprised they don't make all their workers work naked.

Cigarette lighters, phones, walkie talkies, vehicles, absolutely everything is forbidden. Selected few supervisors are issued a BP approved and supplied walkie talkie and everyone walks.

 

[Nanan]

Hell, my dad works for BP Amoco in Whiting, Indiana and they don't allow *anything* in their plant. I'm surprised they don't make all their workers work naked.

Cigarette lighters, phones, walkie talkies, vehicles, absolutely everything is forbidden. Selected few supervisors are issued a BP approved and supplied walkie talkie and everyone walks.

I grew up not to far from that plant in Portage.

I work in the refinery biz these days and yea, they are crazy about what is "Permissible" and "Intrinsically Safe" stuff in plants, it isn't all about security like it is at the DOD a good portion of it is about things that make sparks/heat. Normal everyday electronics are designed to work in a normal atmosphere not one with very high concentration of explosive gasses where a single spark could light up the place.

In some plants have to get a "hot work permit" to even bring a cell phone or camera on site and another permit because they both can take pictures, it seems kinda silly considering I was the one who designed the damn system and have tons of pics and the CAD drawings of the valve/line in my laptop.

 

[Visable-assassin]

yeah they are banned here as well, saldy tho trying to get patient data fast (when a share cant be done) it goes to a cd or dvd...god i wish i could tell you how many DVD's ive seen "wasted" thus far...its scary

 

[drakken]

funny thing is depending on your clearance, a lot of those rules suddenly stop applying. My is archived due to the change in rules of when you needed to have last used it but when I had the one badge I had to jump through all kinds of crazy hoops, but when they issued me the other badge everyone just ignores you as long as it swipes through the scanner. I hope if I had gone some where I shouldn't have someone would have said something though.

 

[Mackintire]

I'm guessing Bitlocker to go or Windows Server 2008 R2 "Direct Connect" has some influence on this.

 

[DanNeely]

I doubt it. The DoD is notoriously slow in upgrading its IT infrastructure. In a few years this might be it, but not yet.

 

[ALL4AMD]

Guess comm is finally getting sick of the massive boost in email traffic since they stopped letting us store files on our personnel thumb drives. When they started this ban we'd have to email files to ourselves to use on different computers because they can't figure out how to create a folder for every single person on the network that is easily accessible. If you was lucky to have access to a shared drive the server url was too crazy and long to remember plus they are generally hidden. Ah well, retirement isn't far off.

@ my guard unit it wasn't the increase of network traffic, it was the issue of having to burn a cd-rw with the crap we needed to fix a machine.

This rule is semi-retarded anyways. Because they still allow us to use normal external HDs which function exactly the same from a PCs perspective. So their just as susceptible to the spread of malicious software as thumb drives are. I think the only reason they did this is because all of the lost/stolen thumb drives that occur while in-theater to alleviate the chances of sensitive/secret information being leaked to the local nationals and the enemy. This was happening all the time when I was there. You could go out to the local markets and see thumb drives with red "SECRET" sticers on them for sale for $5. But still, from what I saw while I was deployed, when you're out at an outpost and comms are spotty from crappy satellite links and your commander needs to get information (special powerpoint slides, hah) to another company commander at another outpost, he's going to take it on a thumb drive and there's no one there to enforce otherwise.

Also @ my guard unit they dissabled all usb mass storage so a usb external hd or flash drive would not work. even with the clearence i needed as a 2E2 i still could not use a USB mass storage device. oh and don't get me started on sipr net.... yuck