Transcend JetFlash 220 Fingerprint Security. Review.

Recently we were asked by some of our users if it is possible to use a biometric (fingerprint) USB stick in combination with the Rohos Logon Software (for example if it is possible to logon using Rohos after a partition is made visible by a recognized fingerprint).

As a matter of fact, we have decided to test several Biometric USB flash drives, to discover which of them are compatible with the Rohos Logon Key.

We would like to present you the Transcend JetFlash 220 USB flash drive 2 Gb (fully compatible with the Rohos Logon) with the embedded fingerprint scanner for biometric access to the secured partition of the USB drive and included software.

Special features of the device:

  • An advanced technology of fingerprints identification, allowing to register up to 10 fingerprints (even from different people);
  • Biometric or password based security for the secured partition, web site logon, and encrypted files;
  • Software based, Data Encryption with AES algorithm based on the 256-bite key.
  • Automatic authorization performed on the web-sites where you have already been registered.
  • There is a program that allows to change the size of the secure partition of the flash drive.
  • The device fully supports Windows 2000, XP and Vista, which was proved by recent tests.
  • You are not able to access the secure partiton without obtaining the Administrator privileges.
  • While the secure partition of the flash drive is open, you are not able to use the un-secure partition of the device and vice-versa.

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Silicon Power F600 FingerPrint Disk. Review

We’d like to present you the review of Silicon Power F600 FingerPrint Disk with 1Gb volume with on-board fingerprint scanner. It’s not compatible with Rohos Logon Key.

Silicon Power F600 FingerPrint Disk на 1Gb со встроенным сканером отпечатка пальца

Silicon Power F600 features:

  • All flash memory is protected. There is no Open part.
  • Biometric or password protection of the USB flash drive (or both, fingerprint + password).
  • Compatible with Windows 2000, XP.  Doesn’t support Windows Vista (however, there is info on the manufacturer’s web page that 2GB models support Vista)
  • There are embedded Programs: File encryption on the disk, Desktop Lock, etc.
  • It’s possible to lock/unlock desktop upon USB drive removal (but not full logon as there is in Rohos).

How the device works:

Once the USB drive is plugged in in “My computer” window will appear two devices, removable drive (for example G:\) and virtual CD-ROM (F:\).

 

drives.jpg

If you try to access disk G:\ now it will not open up. It means that it’s locked. To unlock it you should start up the file: “F:\FingerPrint.exe”, and in the emerged window choose the icon “Unlock”. After this should open up the “fingerprint” authorization window. In this window you may either enter your password or register your fingerprint.

03_fingerprinter.JPG

If you have successfully got authorized the disk G:\ will get unlocked,  and in the taskbar will appear new icon:

05_taskbaricon.JPG

If you double-click on it the program main menu will come up:

02_fingerprintmenu.JPG

From this window you may encrypt the disk back just by pressing the “Unlock” button.

Registering fingerprints:

First you should open the program’s main window and choose the “FP Manager” button. Then enter your name and press the button with the right arrow, and the following window will open up:

04_fingerprintersetup.JPG

Further choose the finger and slide it three times over the scanner, then press right arrow button. In the next window you may set up a password if needed.

“SecretZIP” feature:

In the main menu choose the “SecretZip” button, enroll using fingerprint. The following window will appear:

secretzip.JPG

There are three buttons on the window:

  1. Create Archive – You choose the files and folders you need, and put them in a usual archive *.zip or encrypted *.exe, that could be unzipped only using this program.
  2. Unzip the archive – Just choose beforehand created *.zip file and unzip it into a chosen folder.
  3. Decrypt file – Choose beforehand created encrypted file of *.exe format and the program itself will decrypt it.

Data Synchronization:

In the program’s main menu choose the “Data Synchronization” button, enroll using fingerprint”. The following window will appear:

data-synchronizer.JPG

 

The left icon will lead to the Settings window, the right one to synchronization window:

synchronizer.JPG

There are three buttons (folders) for your disposal. Under each of there there is a button with arrow. If pressing on one of them there will appear the window where you should indicate the path to any folder that is on hard drive and path to the folder from the flash drive for the program to “know” what to synchronize with what. Now you may press the corresponding button (”syncr. my DataSync folder”, “syncr. my favorite folder” or “syncr. my document folder”), then press the“Synchronize” button and that’s it.

Locking computer:

In the program’s main menu choose the “PC Lock” button, enroll using fingerprint. The following window will appear:

06_pclock.JPG

Here you should set up locking settings and press ОК. Now to lock computer you should unplug the flash drive, and to unlock it to plug the flash drive back. Locking the PC is possible only after the flash drive itself is unlocked.

Summary

  1. The device doesn’t work under Windows Vista
  2. On the PC without admin rights the device is not accessible
  3. Presently it’s not compatible with Rohos Logon Key
  4. It’s not possible to format the USB flash drive into NTFS format

Lexar JumpDrive 2GB. Part. 2. Lexar Secure II. (Data Security, USB and Flash)

We go on with the review of the Lexar JumpDrive flash drive with embedded disk encryption software Secure II. It is the component of the USB flash drive and is pre-installed in the Ceedo main menu.

So, The Main Menu Lexar Secure II:

powertogo-secure

After starting Secure II, we see its main window with three main functions: Encrypted Vault , File Encryption and Shredder.

Encrypted Vault offers a disk encryption based on the file-container and transparent on-the-fly encryption.

The creation of the virtual disk is fulfilled in 3 steps. At the last stage the Program enforces the user to enter the password of at least 8 symbols (!!). The password should be entered each time when you want to mount encrypted disk.

The program allows to create several disks:

powertogo-securedisk6

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Lexar JumpDrive 2GB. Part 1. Ceedo

lexar-jumpdrive

Recently we occasionally encountered the USB flash drive Lexar JumpDrive 2GB with embedded USB drive encryption software. The set of the USB device includes the mobile platform PowerToGo (aka Ceedo), and it in its turn has the mobile application Lexar Secure II – that represents a great interest for us. By the way there is an indicator of the free space on the frame of the USB flash drive (see the Figure above) – that is a very useful thing :).

Lexar Secure II allows to create encrypted containers on the USB flash drive (like Rohos Disk). We would like to clear out how the program Secure II (and the platform PowerToGo in whole) works when the computer has no Administrator privileges, and in general the quality and convenience of this program.

1. So, First Starting Up…

powertogo-1

During the first start the application PowerToGo i.e. Ceedo starts. Ceedo is an analogue of the U3 platform for mobile applications from the USB drives. We are briefly familiar with U3 at our blog. To my mind Ceedo is a more sophisticated platform. At Ceedo start-up the pro-active protection of my Norton antivirus rejected almost each operation – that confirms that the platform is very “obsessive” and leaves many tracks on PC.

While starting, Ceedo checks its updates and downloads them without prior asking. This cheers up as Ceedo identified my German Windows and also switched to the German language. It also automatically “mobilized” my MS Word, Excel and MS Outlook Express. Next time I will write a  more detailed information about “Mobilization” of the regular applications with the help of Ceedo Aplication Virtualization.

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eToken Pro/R2, corporate security USB dongles in Rohos Logon

Hi All,

We’ve been working on some important feature: To add USB tokens support to Rohos Logon Key.
Aladdin eToken PRO
We plan to support PKCS11 communication standard to work with USB tokens. The PKCS11 is supported by all industry leading USB tokens such as Aladdin eToken PRO/r2, SafeNet’s iKey, ASEKey Crypto USB Token, ACS USB Tokens and so on.

In General Rohos Logon will be able to support any kind of USB key device, thanks to the special API (plugin model) that is being introduced now. The external key.dll module can handle any type of devices. For example Bluetooth phone/pocket PC for Wireless logon, read about it in the next posts…

In the development room we have now eToken PRO 32kb, eToken R2 16kb and ruToken USB tokens. All tokens already work with Rohos. If you are interested to get a next release preview of Rohos Logon Key please hold on for a while. SOON we will post download links.
Also please keep all your suggestions and feature requests coming. There’s nothing we like better than hearing your ideas and then putting them into action.

Thank you.

Does not require Admin rights to open encrypted disk.

Encrypted Rohos Disk BrowserThe new version of Rohos Disk (1.18) includes new utility, Rohos Disk Browser. This enables you to open and view the contents of secret partitions on a USB drive on any other computer, even if you do not have administrative rights.

Rohos Disk can password-protect a portion of a USB flash drive, by creating a virtual encrypted partition. The partition is protected by a password, and can be opened on any computer. Now, even if you are in an internet cafe and have no administrative rights, you can still have read access to your secret partition with the help of the Rohos Disk Browser utility. This means that you can open any file and read any data. Naturally when you are at your home or office computer, you will still be able to work with your encrypted partition as usual.

On a strange computer you can always open your protected partition on the USB flash drive (in read-only mode) with the help of the Rohos Disk Browser utility. This makes it possible to open or copy only one particular file or directory, without granting access to every file.

This feature is enabled in a Rohos Mini Drive program – FREE and tiny USB drive encryption tool.

Read Rohos Disk Browser description...

Rohos Disk Encryption 1.18 released

We’ve released a new beta version of Rohos Disk Encryption, our password protection app for USB drives and local drives.

Here’s the release notes:

  • Rohos Disk Browser. Allows to open encrypted USB drive partition on any computer even without having Admin privileges
  • Improved ‘protect USB drive’ function
  • Fixed some bugs

Find toghether the problem-solving. What if I cannot log on using the USB key?

Our technical support department often receives messages from users requesting help. The users are unable to log into the system because the USB key is lost or corrupted, and the user has forgotten the PIN code or entered it incorrectly three times, or the system is set up to “allow logon only via USB key”.

To learn more: What if I cannot logon using the USB key?

Rohos Credential Provider for Windows Vista

Rohos Credential Provider for Windows Vista

In this article you will find out about new Rohos Credential provider. It has been designed specially for Windows Vista. It blends into the Operating System logon screen, and is also integrated behind the scenes. With this component, Rohos Logon Key makes it easy to add new method of hardware based authentication by means of USB Flash drive.


Contents:

  • What is Rohos Credential Provider?
  • The Option “Allow to login only by using USB key
  • Emergency Logon in case of loss of the USB Drive
  • Password Change
  • Accessing a Windows Vista remote desktop with a USB key
  • Accessing a Windows Vista computer connected to Windows Active Directory
  • Troubleshooting

Learn more about  how Rohos Credential Provider works in Windows Vista