1 / 7

T13 Change Request re Security Erase

T13 Change Request re Security Erase. Gordon Hughes, CMRR @ UCSD 858-534-5317,gfhughes@ucsd.edu Formerly Seagate (until 1997) PI on NSA Secure Erase R&D program Original requester for SE in T13 and T10 Talk Outline: What SE Change is requested Will it change virus security?

Download Presentation

T13 Change Request re Security Erase

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript


  1. T13 Change Request re Security Erase • Gordon Hughes, CMRR @ UCSD • 858-534-5317,gfhughes@ucsd.edu • Formerly Seagate (until 1997) • PI on NSA Secure Erase R&D program • Original requester for SE in T13 and T10 • Talk Outline: • What SE Change is requested • Will it change virus security? • Example SE utility showing present problem • Background on user benefits of change

  2. Request ATA Spec change • For Security Freeze Lock command: • Remove SE from abort command list, • so Secure Erase can be issued by SE utilities, • by Windows, and by Unix/Linux • Table 10, Security mode command actions • Change SECURITY ERASE PREPARE from ABORTED to EXECUTABLE, in Frozen state • Change SECURITY ERASE from ABORTED to EXECUTABLE, in Frozen state • Virus security will be same as block write SE

  3. Example: CMRR Freeware SE Utility • HDDerase.exe, a DOS floppy boot utility • Downloadable freeware utility from UCSD • Runs only from floppy drive (for virus protection) • 4 erase options: HDD SE, Fast Erase (with random password), • & block write SE (DoD 2550 triple and new DoD) • Checks if Security Feature Set is supported • Tries to turn it on, if set to off by Device Configuration • Checks if drive is Locked or Frozen • If Locked, asks user for HDD password • If Frozen, HDD SE commands Aborted (ATA spec) • Can always SE by block erase (DoD 5220) • CMRR working with Microsoft on Windows SE • Microsoft using utility for R&D to put SE command in Windows • Microsoft is aware of BIOS Freeze Lock problem

  4. Why not just block write SE? (DoD 2550) • Block erase utilities (PC World May 20, 2003): • Summit Computer Hard Disk Scrubber • Jetico Inc.'s $40 BCWipe • LSoft Technologies Inc.'s $30 Active@ KillDisk Pro • Not secure per National Security Agency • Doesn’t erase reassigned blocks, success not certain • HDD SE is up to 3X faster, per CMRR tests • Enhanced SE can qualify for NSA secret data • DoD 2550 is for unclassified and confidential data only • Enhanced SE needs to be implimented and validated

  5. CMRR SE Validation Tests • Tested 35 ATA & SCSI drives for SE • All recent ATA drives SE ok (>10-15 GB) • All 4 system board ports, all command combos, • Power interrupt leaves drive locked • SE doesn’t work if BIOS issues Freeze Lock • All SCSI drives don’t SE (optional in T10) • Means SATA drives all do SE?

  6. Background for Spec change request • 2002, Gartner Dataquest: 150,000 hard drives "retired" • 2003 Garfinkel and Shelat, in newspapers worldwide • and in IEEE Journal of Security & Privacy • They bought 158 used hard drives at computer stores and on eBay. • 49 contained "significant personal information" • Medical correspondence, love letters, pornography,5,000 credit cards. • One had a account numbers from a cash machine in Illinois. • 2002: Pennsylvania sold computers with state employee information • 1997: Arizona pharmacy computer sold with 2,000 customer’s prescriptions. • CMRR buys eBay drives for SE tests • 1/3 have unerased user data.

  7. References • “Secure Erase of Disk Drive Data” IDEMA Insight Magazine, Spring 2002 • Storage Visions Conference Las Vegas, talk on SE and intelligent storage, January 2003 • Letter to Computer World magazine, May 2003 • PC World letter, “Secure Erase Project,” October 2003 • “Secure Erase” CMRR Newsletter, Summer 2003 • DISKCON San Jose talk, Sept 2003

More Related