Google is Releasing a USB-C Titan Security Key

Matt Laboff October 14, 2019 Security

Last year, Google released the Titan security key. It can be used as ultra secure methods for two-factor authentication for some online services over USB-A, NFC, or Bluetooth. Today, Google announced an updated USB-C key to the lineup, which will be available tomorrow from the Google Store for $40.

The new USB-C key appears to have similar functionality to their previous model, all of which are built to the FIDO standard. The USB-C model lacks the NFC capabilities that its other two keys have, but this shouldn’t matter as the USB-C design is meant for you to plug it directly into your portable device, such as phone or ultra-thin laptop. That said, NFC is a bit moot.

Google’s new USB-C key is compatible with Android, Chrome OS, macOS, and Windows devices (Only the Bluetooth key works with iOS, and it requires the installation of Google’s Smart Lock app.) Like its previous keys, Google says the USB-C key’s firmware is permanently sealed into a secure element hardware chip, making the key more resistant to physical attacks.

Google partnered with security key-maker Yubico to manufacture its new USB-C key. Google’s key looks a lot like Yubico’s YubiKey 5C. Both keys are pretty similar, but Yubico’s keys support a few more protocols than Google’s Titan keys do, such as WebAuthn, so they might be the better option for some, depending on what you need.

Google’s other two Titan security keys were previously only available as a $50 bundle, but Google says you’ll be able to buy them individually starting tomorrow. The USB-A / NFC key will cost $25, while the Bluetooth key,

USB Juice Jacking – A Total Long Shot?

Matt Laboff October 4, 2019 Off Topic

Will “USB juice jacking” trend on Twitter anytime soon? Probably not. Should you be paranoid about USB juice jacking? Probably not.

What is USB juice jacking anyway?

The idea is someone, a hacker, trying to steal your data while you are charging up, or “getting juice” from a public USB port.

Yes, it can technically happen, so don’t be fooled. But could it actually happen? Probably not, so don’t sound like a fool.

Getting down to brass tacks of how this could happen, what would a hacker need to pull it off?

First, they’d need to make a connection, either WiFi or Bluetooth. This connection would transmit your valuable data to the hacker. To do that, the hacker needs some sort of device that holds that communication chip. That chip would need to sit behind the USB port in the string of communication. This “device” would also need power.

Given the above, a quick observation of the USB port you are planning to use, will tell you everything you need to know. So basically if you see a big block with a USB port, don’t plug in your device. If it’s a wall mounted USB port, chances are ultra-slim there is a technology behind the placard stealing your data.

So take airport chairs and charging stations for example; as this is the most comment place a website gives for the “scare.” You are not going to get hacked using those ports. First off, airports are high security areas and those charging stations are monitored. Second, the security cameras will pick up on someone trying to tamper with a charging station or USB port on the chair. Third, the people in the terminal need a boarding pass to get to those spots, so their identity is already known if anything suspicious does turn up.

Now, if we are talking a coffee shop just be sure

Erase USB or Clean USB or Format USB?

Matt Laboff September 12, 2019 USB News, USB Tutorials

We’ve seen these terms floating around in forums and How To’s for years when someone is explaining what to do with USB flash drives. I think most people glaze over the definitions of Clean, Erase and Format simply because they believe the terms are interchangeable, or they aren’t planning on doing the task mentioned in the post.

I hope the following information will clear up some terms and definitions so we can all better understand what people are talking about when passing along information about flash drives and the Clean, Erase and Format function.

All of these functions can be performed in your Windows 10 computer, or higher. I will start with the least complicated definition and task, and move along from there.

Format

This function is what 98% of Windows computer operators will use. This is the graphical interface inside Windows when you right click a drive letter and ask the operating system to format the drive. What is this function really doing?

Format is the least complicated of the tasks, and this function is removing the File Allocation Table of the USB and creating a new one. Said a simpler way… this function takes away the list of files sitting on the drive so it then appears blank with no data.

It’s important to note, the files are still on the drive, just not listed in an easy, organized manor which you can see through windows explorer (clicking on the drive letter to see the list of files).

Using the most basic file recovery software tools, like the one we wrote about several months back, you can recover all the files sitting on the drive.

Maybe a picture will help. Looking at the image below you can see the “data” is light grey. Meaning the data is still there, just not easily accessible. This data is what recovery software will look for, find, and list back on your drive. Also notice the boot code of the USB (if you want to load an operating system on your USB stick) isn’t touched either.

You might have questions if a USB flash drive should be formatted as FAT, FAT32, exFAT or NTFS and we did a great post about that a bit earlier as well.

Clean

The Clean function is a bit more in-depth than the format function. This function applies directly to the Master Boot Record (MBR) or boot code mentioned just above.

The Clean function will clear out boot code and will remove any partition on the flash drive. The partition of a flash drive is the information which tells a host computer how big the drive is, and if the partition should be bootable in the event you are trying to start the computer from a flash drive.

The Clean function is not accessible through the GUI of Windows, for example you cannot right click on a drive letter and find the Clean function. The Clean function is only accessible through the Windows utility called DiskPart.

USB4 Is Coming: Here Is The Speed

Matt Laboff September 3, 2019 USB 3.0, USB News

USB 3.2, the most recent, shipping, standard sees a maximum transfer speed of 40Gb per second. USB4 will double that. Said another way, 80Gbps is equal to moving 10,000MB in one second. Said another way, that’s about 10GBs in one second.

Keep in mind, this is all theoretical, maxium speed. Real world applications will not get to this point. Never has, never will.

USB4 is built on Intel’s Thunderbolt technology. You know, the technology Apple tried to force everone to use back in 2012. The big change for USB is the interface. The Thunderbolt licensing setup is expensive and thus, we never saw low priced accessories to accommodate the technology. This is why Intel was always so interested in getting Thunderbolt to be the backbone for USB. It would gain in both speed and reduced price.

USB4 is also backwards compatible with USB 3.2, USB 2.0 and Thunderbolt 3. Since the new standard merges both USB-C and Thunderbolt, we should start to see decreasing accessory price points that utilize faster speeds as USB4 gains popularity.

USB4 device manufacturers must also include USB Power Delivery technology, which regulates device charging. PD can quickly charge your phone or gaming laptop, sending the optimal amount of wattage for each device to charge quickly without damage.

Expect to see the first USB4 products hit the market as early as mid-2020.

Review: Powerhouse 200 Portable Station by Anker

Matt Laboff August 16, 2019 Power for USB

The Anker Powerhouse 200 is a product which you would say “I should have thought of that years ago.” Well this charging station, is truly that, a station of power.

I’m not even going put the features in some lofty gargon sentence, but rather list them off like a spelling test in 5th grade. After you read the following paragraph, I wonder what you will think; here we go…

Input High-Voltage Protection, Output High-Voltage Protection, Input Current Regulation, Automatic Current Matching, Input Short-Circuit Protection, Device Overcharge Protection, Static Resistance, Output Short-Circuit Protection, Output Current Regulation, Battery Overdischarge Protection, Output Temperature Control. That is an awesome sounding product.

Specifications are below, but we couldn’t find out how heavy the Powerhouse 200 weighs.

• Capacity: 57600mAh/218.8Wh
• Input: AC/Power Delivery
• USB Output: 5V=3A (15W)
• Power Delivery Output: 5V=3A, 9V=3A, 15V=2A, 20V=1.5A (30W)
• DC Output: 12V=5A
• AC Output: 110V, 0.9A, 60Hz, 100W
• AC Waveform: Pure Sine Wave
• Total Output: 130W Max
• Operating Temperature: 32°F-104°F / 0°C-40°C
• Recharging Temperature: 14°F-104°F / -10°C-40°C

Product page from retailer:

About Anker Electronics:

Features to Consider When Buying a USB Duplicator

Matt Laboff August 3, 2019 Nexcopy Inc., Test Equipment, USB 3.0, USB Gadgets, USB Input Device, USB News

Came across an article today, which I thought was a very good read. It’s a niche article, but for anyone who deals with flash drives, I would suggest checking it out.

From the article:

The optical drive is nearly dead – they are no longer found in laptops and rarely found in tower PCs. With that said, the trend for giving out data is shifting to USB flash, not CD or DVD media. Because of this shift, many companies are taking a closer look at buying a USB duplicator.

There are several factors one must consider before spending thousands of dollars on a USB duplicator. We have broken down the most important considerations into four categories. After reviewing these four categories, you should have an excellent idea of which type of duplicator is best for your organization.

Speed is the first area you should analyze to figure out which direction you should go. When considering speed, we are not simply talking about the copy speed of the USB duplicator, but other factors as well, such as number of USB sockets and the user interface required for feedback during operation. Questions you should ask, include:

# How many USB drives will you need to copy in a day or week?

# How large is the data load in MBs or GBs?

# What kind of turn-around time do you have between a duplication request and when that request should be completed?

# Is there printing, or branding required, on the outside of the USB?

# Do you need proof of performance via a log file?

Answering the above questions will give you an idea of what type of USB duplicator to consider. The type of duplicator will be size, how many USB sockets, copy speed of the duplicator and what type of software, if any, your organization will need.

Your next step is to consider the production crew who will be running the equipment. Will there be non-technical people running the equipment, or will a more hands-on approach be required? Is the IT department looking to restrict user access to the equipment or restrict access to the data content during the duplication process?

Much of the above depends on how the data is received before copied to the USB flash drive. For example, a duplication company might receive a physical master from a client; where-as a fulfillment house may get content delivered from a server from an on-line order submission process.

Will the organization require multiple USB duplicators located in different parts of the world? Said another way, many global companies standardize on one manufacturer so the user experience is the same across multiple locations. This also makes production easier as both support and experience can be shared between divisions to streamline processes on a global scale.

Knowing the production crew, their capabilities and responsibilities will help narrow the search for the right piece of equipment.

The third category worth investigating is asking the state of what the USB should be once sent delivered. Is the organization looking to ship out a read-only flash drive? By default all flash drives are read-write. Because of this, many organizations fear a virus could jump onto the drive and spreading to other computers. With that fear in mind, most companies are looking for a USB duplicator which creates a read-only drive product. This means the USB drive is locked, or write protected. The files cannot be deleted or formatted off the drive, and more importantly, files cannot jump onto the drive.

Nexcopy is world leader in read-only flash drive duplicators and therefore used as an example of a duplicator system worth considering.

Will The Optical Drive Survive Another Year?

Matt Laboff October 14, 2019 Nexcopy Inc.

USB Flash Drive Doesn’t Get Assigned a Drive Letter: Solution

Matt Laboff September 19, 2019 USB Hacks, USB News, USB Tutorials

You’ve connected a USB flash drive, heard the familiar Windows sound of connection, yet no drive letter shows up. You then go into Disk Management for Windows and see the device and memory, but the USB flash drive doesn’t get assigned a drive letter.

What should you do?

Most of the time, Windows will automatically assign a drive letter to any connected storage device—whether it’s a USB stick, USB hard drive, or other mass storage device.

However, if a drive letter isn’t assigned, there’s a quick fix to get your computer working properly again:

1. Open Command Prompt as Administrator (search for CMD, then right-click and select “Run as Administrator”).
2. Type diskpart and press Enter.
3. Once in DISKPART, type automount enable and press Enter.

If the above steps don’t solve the problem, there could be conflicting registry entries from past USB devices that disabled or interfered with the automount function.

Nexcopy offers a registry cleaning tool specifically designed for USB devices connected to your computer. This utility is an executable file that requires no installation and contains no spyware or malware. Nexcopy is a reputable company that provides direct support via phone, email, or live chat, so you can trust their software is safe and reliable.

USBScrub is the utility name and is available for download here.

How To Enable Disable USB Write Protection in Windows 10

Matt Laboff September 6, 2019 USB Hacks, USB News, USB Tutorials

The link below is for a ZIP file that contains two batch files to either enable or how to disable USB write protection on a Windows 10 computer. These batch files also work on Windows 7 machines.

This solution is ultra-easy and very quick: one click to run the registry edit file and one click to confirm the task. That’s it.

Typically, a person will want to lock down the USB ports of a computer to ensure a virus doesn’t spread through a USB device, such as a flash drive. This batch file provides a fast and simple way to both lock down your USB ports and easily unlock them again.

Important: Do not have a USB flash drive connected to the system when you run either batch file.

For those seeking more technical details, here is the specific registry edit being applied. Changing the DWORD value to 00000001 sets the device policy for the computer to be write-protected. Changing that value back to 00000000 restores normal read/write access.

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\
StorageDevicePolicies]
“WriteProtect”=dword:00000001

Note: This USB write protection method is specific to the PC on which it is applied. It is not device-specific and will not follow the USB drive to other machines.

If you require USB write protection that is permanent on the device itself and universal across all computers, contact Nexcopy.com and ask about their Lock License USB drives. This hardware-level solution is embedded in the USB controller, ensuring the drive is always write-protected, preventing any possibility of a virus being written to the USB stick. This is the best universal solution for USB write protection.

Screenshots of the Batch File Process

Batch files included in the ZIP:

Windows confirmation prompt after running the batch file:

Task completion screen:

Download link for the two batch files:

USB Write Protection Registry Edit Batch Files

USB Wall Charger With Hidden Surveillance Camera

Matt Laboff August 20, 2019 Security, USB Gadgets, USB T.V., Video, Wireless

With USB gadgets like this, it’s hare to imagine companies like ADT stay in business for residential customers. This working USB charger includes a miniature camera which acts like a surveillance camera. You can plug any USB gadget into it for charging, all the while record or stream video for what is going on within it’s view.

Use your Android or iPhone you may stream directly to your connected app or stream to a group of people you’ve authorized within the app. The spy camera records 1080p HD footage and will also record that video to the 32GB microSD card (included). Bonus: You can set the surveillance camera to record only when it detects motion.

The camera view is anything directly in front of the plug, so no ability to turn the camera itself, but that is a simple enough problem to solve, just use an outlet that is in-line with the viewing area you want to record.

Here are some noteworthy bullet points about what you will get for the low price of $29USD:

• Motion Detection – Can be set to initiate recording only when motion is detected and then send a notification directly to your phone.
• Loop Recording – Can be set to automatically record over old footage, allowing for uninterrupted video recording.
• Night Mode – Can be set for recording in dim and low light environments.
• Multi-Use – Allows for multiple users to connect to the same device (Supports up to 8 users)
• Multi-View – Allows for multiple cameras to be connected to the same APP / Software. (Supports up to 8 cameras)

The Evela spy camera comes with

Hynix Enters US Market With Ultra-Fast SSD Drive

Matt Laboff August 15, 2019 Press Releases

Today, Hynix put out a press release on their Gold S31 solid-state drive (SSD). The SATA III, first generation, is the first of their SuperCore series of products.

With a 560MB/s read speed, this device becomes an ideal SSD drive for high demand users, such as Gamers. What’s also somewhat unique about the new Gold S31 drives is that they’re entirely built in-house.

“All key components in Gold S31, from NAND flash and built-in controller to DRAM and firmware, were designed and produced by SK Hynix. The in-house components are built for robust performance and reliability,” SK Hynix says.

What is more interesting, at least for us at this moment, is the history of SK Hynix we uncovered by doing some research about the company.

I always wondered what happen to Maxtor, an optical media giant back in the early 2000s. Well, SK Hynix bought them. SK Hynix is the third largest conglomerate in South Korea.

Hynix is the world’s second-largest memory chipmaker (after Samsung ) and the world’s 3rd-largest semiconductor company. Founded as Hyundai Electronic Industrial Co., Ltd. in 1983 and hasn’t stopped growing since.

Hynix memory is well know for quality flash and used in products made by Apple, Asus, Google, Dell, Nexcopy and Hewlett Pakard.

The company also merged with LG Semiconductors in 1999.

These guys had an operating income of 18 billion for 2018, so it’s a company with

Only One USB Drive Can Be Used In Windows – Others Are Ignored

Matt Laboff July 31, 2019 Flash Storage, USB Hacks

The most common reason why only one USB drive can be used in Windows is due to multiple USBs connected with the same USB device signature, or disk signature collision.

If you are dealing with bootable devices and seeing this problem, we are confident a collision is the issue. If you are not dealing with a bootable device, then our information below will probably not help.

What is a USB signature collision?

A signature collision can happen on any bootable device, such as Compact Flash cards, SD cards, microSD cards, and USB flash drives. A disk signature is a unique identifier number (UID). It is a unique identifier stored as part of the MBR (Master Boot Record) for an operating system loaded on the device. The operating system uses the UID to identify and distinguish between storage devices. It is commonly made up of eight alphanumeric characters. A disk collision occurs when your operating system (Windows) detects that there are two disks with identical signatures.

For Windows 7, 8, 8.1, and 10, these versions of Windows will disable the second drive and will not allow that second volume to mount until the disk collision has been rectified. If you are reading this article, chances are, this is exactly what is happening to you.

The first thing to do is navigate to the Disk Management tool within Windows. To do this, use the search tool and type in Disk Management. This will take you to the utility that Windows offers. Here you can see your multiple devices connected. If you click or hover over the device not working you will see one of two messages:

“The boot selection failed because a required device is inaccessible” or “This disk is offline because it has a signature collision.”

What created the USB disk signature collision?

Making a bit-by-bit copy of one device to another, like using a USB duplicator, would create a disk signature collision. Because these binary duplicators copy the MBR information, that UID is also copied to the target device. Stepping forward, once those two devices are connected to the same computer, “boom” you get the collision.

Chances are, the situation you are in right now is due to a cloning process you have just completed. But don’t worry, we have the fix!

Fixing a USB disk signature collision

There are two methods for fixing the collision issue. The first solution is using DiskPart, which is a free command line tool provided by Microsoft and is found on all Windows 10 computers. This is a one-by-one process. If you have multiple devices with this problem and need to fix all of them, best to use option number two.

DiskPart Method

To launch DiskPart, simply go to the search function and type DiskPart

You now see the command prompt for DiskPart and type list disk

DiskPart will list all the storage devices connected to your computer. From this list, identify which USB is your problem device. The easiest way to determine this is to check the capacity for the drive listed by DiskPart.

Select the disk you want to change the signature ID for, for example Disk 1, which is the second disk listed (typically disk 0 is your C drive). Type select disk 1

Now that disk one is selected, type uniqueid disk and the utility will spit out the disk signature for disk 1.

Our final step is to change this value. Knowing a hexadecimal value we can use, such as A53AEBE9, type the following in DiskPart: unique disk ID=A53AEBE9 and click Enter.

With this change, you can now go into Disk Management and put the device Online. When the device is online, Windows Explorer will see the device and you can use it. There is no longer a USB disk signature collision.

If your hexadecimal value will not take, it means your MBR file doesn’t have a signature you can change. You will need to flash the device with your bootstrap code. More details on that from a previous article found here.

Another reason why option number two, below, is better is that the hexadecimal number assigned to the partition is automatic and works. There is no guessing on what hexadecimal to assign to the partition, a step you must do in DiskPart.

The second solution is downloading the free Partition Wizard and opening the software. The Partition Wizard software will automatically identify the USB disk signature collision and update the necessary MBR. Super simple!

There is more technical information about disk collision issues from Wikipedia. You can brush up on the details there if so inclined.