IBM is banning its staff from using removable storage devices everywhere, according to an advisory to its employees.
First reported by The Register, the reasons cited were to prevent the leaks and security breaches, which might be disruptive for a company by the means of financial and reputational damage from lost, stolen or misplaced removable storage devices.
The company “is expanding the practice of prohibiting data transfer to all removable portable storage devices (eg: USB, SD card, flash drive),” said IBM global chief Information security officer Shamla Naidoo.
The advisory stated some IBM offices have had this policy for a while, but “over the next few weeks we are implementing this policy worldwide.”
The staff were advised to use IBM’s preferred sync ‘n’ share service to move data around.
But the advisory also admitted that the move may be “disruptive for some.”
As for that, IBM is taking notes of staff objections, and might consider some exceptions, such as patch and software deployments, and others.
