PARIS--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Seventy percent of employees use USB flash drives from outside the company and connect them to the company network, and 68 percent take no precautions before inserting them into their work computer1.
USB flash drives, whether they are new or used, are major sources of infection for company IT systems. They are in widespread use, particularly in certain sectors such as in industry, education and healthcare, both for sharing documents and for updating software.
A new mobile terminal to remind people to decontaminate USB flash drives
Available
until now as a fixed 70kg booth or as a software version installed on
computers, the Malware Cleaner solution is now available in a
“mini-terminal” version. Thanks to this cheaper, mobile version,
businesses can facilitate the decontamination of users’ USB flash
drives. This portable version can be found at a reception desk, in
meeting rooms or even shared between different sites as needed.
Five integrated anti-virus search engines to detect threats
Orange
Cyberdefense experts and their “ethical hacking” teams developed Malware
Cleaner. Quick and easy to use, all you have to do is insert the USB
flash drive to find out if it is has been infected. If it has, the user
can choose to delete the file or put it into quarantine. It is also
possible to print off a report for a more detailed analysis of the flash
drive: infected files details, signature of detected attack, and the
name of the anti-virus search engines that detected the infected file.
Malware Cleaner simultaneously uses five anti-virus search engines to optimize and combine the extent and performance of detection. These search engines are automatically updated on a daily basis when the terminal is connected to the internet via the network or using 4G. It also has an embedded detection engine for BadUSB type attacks that are undetectable by traditional anti-virus software, which can take control of the computer.
In addition, Malware Cleaner includes an admin platform to remotely manage the terminals. This allows to check they are running accurately and being updated, to receive usage statistics in real-time, find out the number of infected files and the types of attack detected. All this precious information helps to improve the company's cybersecurity.
Industry, an exposed sector
In the industry sector, the computers
used to control production lines are not connected to the internet for
security reasons. The USB ports on these machines are therefore
regularly used to carry out maintenance diagnostics and recover SCADA
logs, or to carry out updates. This makes them particularly vulnerable
to attacks via USB flash drives. Thanks to the Malware Cleaner software
solution installed on a computer located at the entrance of the
production area, and the addition of a security protocol that makes it
compulsory to check all USB devices on this specific computer, the
production line is protected from USB flash drive attacks.
"USB flash drives are a real danger for IT security within companies. Even if these attacks are more complicated to set up than attacks by e-mail, for example, they are nevertheless to be feared. Introducing USB flash drives into the heart of the company makes it possible to spread malicious code, paralyze machines, destroy sensitive data and even workstations. Ransomware can be installed on an industrial system simply by inserting a USB flash drive, with no need for the user to do anything at all," says Alexis Richard, Product Manager at Orange Cyberdefense.
Best practices for USB flash drive use
- Never connect a USB flash drive of unknown origin to a workstation
- Renew employees' USB flash drives to avoid the propagation of malware
- Provide employees with USB flash drives to prevent the use of external equipment
- Systematically check USB flash drives when they have been connected to an unsecured environment
- Only connect decontaminated flash drives to industrial computers
About Orange Business Services
Orange Business Services, the B2B
branch of the Orange Group, and its 22,000 employees, is focused on
supporting the digital transformation of multinational enterprises and
French SMEs across five continents. Orange Business Services is not only
an infrastructure operator, but also a technology integrator and a
value-added service provider. It offers companies digital solutions that
help foster collaboration within their teams (collaborative workspaces
and mobile workspaces), better serve their customers (enriched customer
relations and business innovation), and support their projects (enriched
connectivity, flexible IT and cyberdefense). The integrated technologies
that Orange Business Services offer range from Software Defined Networks
(SDN/NFV), Big Data and IoT, to cloud computing, unified communications
and collaboration, as well as cybersecurity. Orange Business Services
customers include over 3,000 renowned multinational corporations at an
international level and over two million professionals, companies and
local communities in France.
Learn more at www.orange-business.com or follow us on LinkedIn, Twitter and our blogs.
Orange is one of the world’s leading telecommunications operators with annual sales of 41 billion euros in 2017 and has 273 million customers in 29 countries at 31 December 2017. Orange is listed on Euronext Paris (symbol ORA) and on the New York Stock Exchange (symbol ORAN).
Orange and any other Orange product or service names included in this material are trademarks of Orange or Orange Brand Services Limited.
1 source: Ponemon Institute, 2014
