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iPod Threatens UK Military Security

20 GB iPod

Following up on my screed against the idea of the “iPod security threat”, James Duncan Davidson sent me a link to this story about how the UK military has decided that the iPod is a security threat.

“With USB devices, if you plug it straight into the computer you can bypass passwords and get right on the system,” RAF Wing Commander Peter D’Ardenne told Reuters.

“That’s why we had to plug that gap,” he said, adding that the policy was put into effect when the MoD switched to the USB-friendly Microsoft XP operating system over the past year.

Huh. Do you mean to tell me that if you plug into the USB port of a PC that no one is logged in to, you can get access to the contents of the PC without logging in? You know, that sounds more like a Windows security flaw than an iPod problem. I mean, it’s reasonable for the military to ban external media in order to prevent their personnel and contractors from copying sensitive data onto personal devices for unknown purposes. But this Windows security hole seems, well, huge.

And the truth is that these articles that single out the iPod as a security threat are being disingenuous, in that it’s much easier and much cheaper to use a USB Flash Drive. Furthermore, this banning of storage devices really only keeps honest people honest; those who really want to copy sensitive information to take home will figure out a way to do it if they’re motivated enough.

So yeah, highly sensitive security establishments should ban personal external storage devices to keep honest people honest, but really, they should also fix the real security problem with their operating system of choice.

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