14 DAY TRIAL // Kingston has recently announced its latest line of high-security, government-aimed USB flash drives. Known as the DataTraveler 5000 flash drives, the devices measure 77.9mm x 22mm x 12.05mm, are designed for USB 2.0 and may operate at temperatures between 0°C an 60°C. They also have a rugged titanium-coated stainless-steel casing that makes them sturdy and waterproof. In addition, they come backed by a five-year warranty and 24/7 customer support.
The flash drives utilize a technology that supports both 256-bit XTS-AES encryption and Suite B cryptography, including ECC. The actual technology is the patented Secured by SPYRUS and the Suite B algorithms were especially selected and approved by the "U.S. government and the Department of Defense for use in multinational data sharing environments including both classified and unclassified applications."
This alone is a testament to the high level of data security provided by the flash drives, security only enforced by the XTS-AES. This cypher mode for encryption is significantly superior to CBC, ECB and other modes. Overall, these two elements combined allowed the DataTraveler 5000 USB flash drives to gain FIPS 140-2 Level 2 certification.
"The DataTraveler 5000 delivers unsurpassed levels of security and encryption to government and enterprise customers," Mark Akoubian, business manager, Secure USB Products, Kingston, said. "This portable data solution represents state-of-the-art data protection while providing end users with the simplicity of plug and play."
FIPS 140-2 certification is given after a certain device passes the federal requirements set by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). Level 2 certification means that the drives will have a tamper-evident construction. This means that end-users will know immediately if their storage unit has been tampered with. FIPS Level 2 encryption is used by many governmental agencies in the United States that require that the sensitive data not stored in the network ("data at rest") meets this standard.
With respective prices of $111, $185, $231 and $400, the Kingston DataTraveler 5000 USB flash drives have capacities of 2GB, 4GB, 8GB and 16GB. They all possess a power-on self test that verifies the integrity of their encryption mechanism and are expected to gain FIPC 140-2 level 3 certification soon. In addition, they may boast an onboard Malware scanning application and US government customers will even benefit from a variety of Trade Agreement Act-compliant (TAA) products. The manufacturer has also set up a dedicated federal sales team.