[mwchang]

[BBC] IBM workers banned from using USB sticks
Full story: http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-44069488

Staff at IBM have been banned from using removable memory devices such as USB sticks, SD cards and flash drives.

The possibility of "financial and reputational" damage if staff lost or misused the devices prompted the decision, reported The Register.

Instead, IBM staff who need to move data around will be encouraged to do so via an internal network.

The decree banning removable storage acknowledges that complying with it could be "disruptive".

Losing data

.... more ....

[Malachi]

And?

[flyzipper]

They're providing technology and services to companies in regulated industries who've banned portable storage for years.

They also preach about the value of information governance, so... what took them so long?

[kernel-panic69]

Yep. I know of a couple of companies first-hand that the bios is locked out and usb removable storage is locked out on. I've had to open and delete emails after printing contents because of this since the other issue was that a printer couldn't be added to the laptops in question because of access policies.

[tedm]

Nonsense like this does not prevent someone from walking in with a phone and a USB OTG ethernet adapter, unplugging the ethernet cable from the back of their PC and into the router, then bridging over to it from the phone and then using X-plore file manager on the phone to access files on the network servers. For the smart guys who put MAC address filtering on the switches you just need a rooted phone and the Mac Address Ghost app or equivalent.

[kernel-panic69]

That's if you are able to view such information about the disconnected workstation. Some company IT folks lock a lot of things down. For example, I know of some laptops I have had my hands on that you can join any wi-fi network you wish, BUT, hardware details are not visible and you cannot get to a lot of things without proper access or cracking in. And the easiest way to crack in these days is.... with.... a.... USB flash drive. Heck, there's workstations and laptops now that don't even have dvd-rom drives. SO, .... yeah, next.