Posted on 07/26/2009 1:46:23 PM PDT by poiuqwer
I suspect that China might be stealing our confidential data that is stored (or backed up) on external USB hard disks, such as those 1 TB commodities sold as Costco for $100.
Early this year, I bought two 1 TB external USB drives to backup my computer. These drives cost a little over $100 with a five-year warranty. I figured, for redundancy, Id copy my main C-drive data files to both drives, just in case one dies.
Sure enough, six months later, I get the Windows XP error message USB Device Not Recognized: one of the USB devices attached to this computer has malfunctioned, and Windows does not recognize it.
Im a technician. I know how to diagnose whether it really did fail or was something else. For example, I switched ports, shuffled devices, and tried it on other machines. The USB drive no longer works and its not the computer. I cannot access the disk and I no longer get a drive letter. I neither let the drive over heat nor did I bump it while it was running. It just failed.
Heres where it becomes interesting. Its terribly easy for me to return this drive. I just go online, fill out a form, attach it to the containing box, and mail it off for $5. The manufacturer will return a new drive with no questions asked. I have done this before. BUT, I noticed on the back of the drive that it was manufactured in China.
Now I have to ask my suspicious self these questions:
(1) What if only the internal USB port (not the actual drive) has burned out? Then the drive would still be perfectly intact, but useless to me. If I return it (so easily done and encouraged to do) then is my drive shipped back to Communist China?
(2) Could China have an army of thousands of PRC engineers that merely pop these returned drives out of the USB container, plug them into a Borg-like array of SATA and IDE ports that automatically start downloading the files building a huge secret database that is cross referenced with the people and companies that returned it? They have an address and company name for sure. They will definitely have all sorts of data on the drives.
(3) What if the USB devices are engineered to stochastically burn out first; before the actual internal drive? Would this be a method for China to get Americans to ship their data back to them completely intact after six months of stuffing data on them? I know that without the USB port working, I cannot cryptographically wipe the disk before I send it back. If I open the case to bypass the USB port and access the still working drive directly, then the warranty becomes invalid.
This is why I RAID stripe my external disks (or encrypt them) so that when I return any one disk, no complete information is on them. But how many people bother? I know lots of people that just return them with a grimace on their face.
IMHO I don’t think that a Chinese guy in Shanghai is looking for the files of some guy on Free Republic.
I do not know about the other services. But, I can attest the USAF no longer allows the use of thumb drives or camera flash drives into networked computers.
And what would the Chinese do with that? I’ll tell you: not a damn thing. That’s always the problem with paranoia, when push comes to shove you’re not worth the effort you think they’re putting in to steal your stuff.
Ah, you are just in your own little world, aren't you?. It's not about me or you, or my data, or yours. It's about China vs. America. Haven't you been paying attention to the last few decades? These people just bought an aircraft carrier. Taiwan? Firewalls? Tiananmen Square? Little Red Book?
If you are planning on going to war some day, every advantage is painstakingly accumulated; like supporting socialists for US presidents and enticing a superpower to move its manufacturing base over to them. It's straight from Sun Tsu -- another Chinese. I can see all sorts of ways having a cross-referenced history of a small set of data on common citizens can give a military advantage in war, and I'm probably just scratching the surface. The Chinese have been using information on their citizens against their own people for years. Do you argue that they don't know how to use information on us against us; just because you haven't spent anytime thinking about it?
I also have a disk array of, originally 750 GB Seagate Barracudas that had 5 year warranties. They were a couple hundred dollars when I bought them. That adds up. With the warranty, I just return them. So far, I've returned three drives. They do not have any useful information on them as individuals. But when two drives failed recently (a fan web out and some overheated), I began to think. Two drives constitute a recoverable strip. These are bad disks -- not USB ports. I'm just projecting the thought process on the USB drives. But what about internal drives on an array?
They bought that aircraft carrier a long time ago. And there’s nothing on my harddrive or yours that will help them actually do anything with it.
Having a bunch of porn and MP3s filched off our drives isn’t going to help them any. As others have pointed out, if they REALLY wanted our computer info they’ve got much much easier ways to get it than hoping the “right” people buy the “right” external drive and do the “right” things with it after it breaks in the “planned” way.
I suspect their efforts are a little more targeted. Poking into your stuff for defense-related information would be like searching for a needle in a haystack. If they start messing around with identity theft on a large scale - the only way to do this profitably, given that most of the data are junk - investigators stateside will eventually figure out which storage manufacturer is responsible after questioning the victims. I don’t think any Chinese hardware manufacturer is going to let itself be roped into this kind of scheme - the consequence of discovery would be the liquidation of a business that requires quite a bit of investment capital. The plant owner who did the lead paint thing for Tyco committed suicide not to take responsibility - he did it because his business was toast, and he couldn’t take the shame of starting from scratch as just another employee instead being the big boss.
Have ya tried the HD recovery tools available commercially and on the net ?
That aside fabricate a pinky and the brain scenario of dominating the world, encrypt it with best Diffie Hellman Merkel key effort ya have , add goobermint cover sheets and send it in for repair. If your have Chinese girls flirting with ya in a week or less ......yer answer is yes !
It could be extremely profitable for them. If it was the interface that went bad and not the hard drive, they can simply wipe the hard drive and install it in another usb device and sell it as new after checking to see if they could use any data on it themselves.
They avoid most of the costof a new USB hard drive by reusing the hard drive from a previously failed device.
Them chicom chickies show up to see you SP is going to war.....:o)
LOL !
eSATA(n) is the way to go.
VA does not allow flash drives either. Not just because of what can go out on them, but what can come IN on them as well.
My refinery client cites spyware and viruses found on some USB drives right out of the box. So this goes beyond an employee bringing in his own USB thumb drive from home and infecting his work computer (and the network) with whatever may have been on his home computer.
You might also just try plugging the drive into a different computer.
A few months ago, one of my thumb/flash drives apparently died manifesting similar symptoms. An internet search of the error message led me to suspect a registry problem.
I plugged it into a different computer; it was recognized, and I copied the data off it and onto a new drive.
Can't be done unless you work at a scrap yard and attach it to a magnetic car hoist.
The only time I got a virus on any computer in the last four years was due to my Daughter bringing home a thumbdrive from school and using it without scanning it first.
She's recovering nicely BTW ;)
lol...I understand.
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