After nearly 15 years of development, USB storage devices come in just about every conceivable shape and size, from 1 GB thumb drives fashioned as sushi rolls to standard external drives containing up to 1.5 TB in capacity. Once a mere novelty peripheral, these devices are seemingly as common as the mouse and keyboard. Analysts say by 2010 the market will have shipped 2.8 billion USB-enabled devices.

Unfortunately, even as USB devices have evolved into useful storage media, they've also turned into a security nightmare for organizations. The development of USB technology including USB storage devices has always been about ease of use, connectivity, low cost and performance with little if any thought to security. It is not only corporate users that enjoy the benefits of today's USB devices. Cyber-criminals and data thieves are increasingly using removable media to introduce malware and steal information from computers. One only need read the news regularly to see that USB devices are involved time and time again in today's highest profile data breaches, either through the loading of breach-causing malware into the backend corporate network, by facilitating intentional covert removal of copied data, or simply by enabling data loss through the misplacement of an unencrypted device.