Seagate Unveils Seagate DriveTrust Technology

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Seagate Technology is introducing a new security platform that delivers a simple way to deploy the highest levels of security for computing systems, computer electronics and mobile devices by protecting data where it lives - on the hard disc drive. The platform, Seagate DriveTrust Technology, combines strong, fully automated hardware-based security with a programming foundation that makes it easy to add security-based software applications for organization-wide encryption key management, multi-factor user authentication and other capabilities that help lock down digital information at rest. DriveTrust Technology works by encasing the security operations in the hard drive, making the technology easy to deploy as the drive itself.

Seagate's security breakthrough comes as more high-value information such as financial data, digital multi-media content and personal data is stored on hard drives. Stolen data can cost organizations and consumers dearly. Plundered trade secrets and intellectual property can mean millions of dollars in lost business. Pilfered personal information such as address books, account information and social security numbers threaten consumers with the high cost of identity theft. Family photos, video and music downloads, often numbering in the hundreds if not thousands, stored on computers, carry their own inestimable value. The proliferation of this precious data on mobile devices increases the potential risks.

For many organizations, compliance with data security and privacy legislation such as Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act and the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act has become a priority, making the security of critical digital content - including the secure disposal of electronic files to end the data lifecycle - a fundamental requirement. At the same time, content providers need stronger forms of security to protect their digital assets and enable new business models.

DriveTrust delivers new levels of simplicity and transparency for securing digital information. The Seagate security platform automatically protects all drive data, not just selected partitions or files, at all times, and its security functions operate independently of the hard drive, preserving the hard drive's full performance. DriveTrust also offers these benefits:
- With DriveTrust, secure hard drives are as easy to install and operate as standard drives. The security capabilities run transparently within the drive with no need for additional configuration. Set up can be as simple as creating a password for user authentication.
- Drive-level security requires no patches, updates or upgrades, eliminating many of the costs associated with traditional software solutions. DriveTrust Technology hard drives free IT organizations from having to distribute software updates or manage software versions, ensuring consistent and reliable security for data at rest.
- Information stored on DriveTrust Technology drives can be instantly erased, making it easy to re-deploy and retire the drives and reducing the time and costs traditionally associated with overwriting and erasing disc data.
- DriveTrust Technology gives independent software vendors a platform for building stronger security applications. The DriveTrust Technology software developer kit includes the documentation and tools necessary to build DriveTrust Technology-enabled applications such as access controls needed to manage encryption keys, passwords and other forms of authentication for large deployments.

Seagate is committed to an open, standards-based architecture that will enable the implementation of DriveTrust Technology across all storage devices. Toward that end, an independent laboratory is certifying DriveTrust algorithms including encryption (AES and TripleDES), public key (RSA), and authentication (SHA-1). Seagate is also standardizing DriveTrust Technology's encryption, authentication tools and other security building blocks in a formal TCG storage specification that is scheduled for public release in early 2007. The TCG specification will enable manufacturers of hard drives and devices that use them to easily deploy security capabilities such as encryption and user authentication.

Seagate Delivers DriveTrust Technology with Momentus 5400 FDE.2 and DB35 Series Seagate currently offers a hard disc drive family featuring DriveTrust Technology, the DB35 Series hard drives for digital video recorders (DVRs) and other digital entertainment devices. The DB35 Series hard drives are the first to enable manufacturers to lock a drive to the system, allowing service providers to deploy DVRs that protect recorded content from illicit copying and distribution if the 3.5-inch, 7200-RPM drive is removed.

In the first quarter of calendar 2007, Seagate plans to introduce Momentus 5400 FDE.2 for notebook computers, the first hard drive with full disc encryption. Momentus 5400 FDE.2 provides an easy, cost-effective way to prevent unauthorized access to all notebook PC data in case the system or disc drive is lost, stolen, retired or resold. The 2.5-inch, 5.400-RPM drive's hardware-based full disc encryption delivers significantly stronger protection than traditional encryption approaches by securely performing all cryptographic operations and access control within the drive. For users, only a password is needed to self-authenticate for full drive access, while third- party enhancements enable thumbprint and smart card options for multi-factor self-authentication. In addition, no time-consuming disc initialization or configuration is required to deploy the drive.

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