IT issued us encrypted thumb drives... what tools should I have on it?

[heyjoojoo]

..what tools should I include on our thumb drives. Here's what I've been told to have so far:

• Stinger
• Spybot S&D
• Malwarebytes
• Treesize
• Net Scan
• Windows Easy Transfer Tool

Any others?
I'm in an office environment and the IT Managers have issued encrypted thumb drives to the IT Analysts.

 

[Trucidation]

If your company issued you the drives, didn't they issue you the tools as well? Kinda odd to have them give you the hardware but then ask you to find the software yourselves.

 

[jimbo45]

Hi there
IMO a much better thing to have on these drives is to head over to the W8 forums and install the W8 to go ("bootable Windows on a Stick" and install your favourite programs). This feature will be included in the W8 enterprise version -- hopefully someone can get this stuff to work for W7 but so far no joy.

I have a great external bootable SSD drive -- via an esata or USB 3 slot it works faster than the "standard laptops hard drive system" and even using a bog standard external usb drive its fast enough to be really useful.

Windows 8 To Go - Setup on a USB Flash Drive or USB Disk - Windows 8 Forums

note: w8 consumer preview is a free download.

cheers
jimbo

 

[heyjoojoo]

If your company issued you the drives, didn't they issue you the tools as well? Kinda odd to have them give you the hardware but then ask you to find the software yourselves.

My original post includes the details regarding what several have recommended. Several staff have suggested different things. Seems like there would be a few IT Techs out there who understand better my situation and may suggest some programs and might even say that I don't need all those things. So, it's not really all that strange but thanks for your contribution.

 

[Trucidation]

Yeah, usually over here they give us the software as well because they want things standardized, rather than later having engineer A call us up and say he can't do X but engineer B says he can and it turns out he has a different version of one of the tools or something like that, heh. Some things are really version sensitive, grumbleIBMdriversgrumble.

 

[barrywebb]

I'm with Trucidation on this. If IT have issued the drives, it's best to speak with them as to how they would like you to use them. I have to say, it would have been better had they told you how they wanted to use the drive when they gave it to you.

An encrypted USB drive is generally used to secure sensitive data that needs to be used across multiple machines. Running from a USB flash drive, encrypted or otherwise, increases the risk of data loss.

Finally, unless the encryption hardware is accessible at boot, you can't load an operating system on an encrypted USB drive. Typically, the device encryption is enabled/disabled via an executable designed for the particular operating system. Most offer Windows in various flavours, some OSX and a few Linux.

 

[indianacarnie]

Personally I'd drop the Spybot and add SuperAntiSpyware to the list you gave. Ccleaner too.

 

[alphanumeric]

MSDaRT can come in handy if you can get your hands on it.