ITinfo: Two-Headed Hard Drive Thwarts Internet Crackers

Two Disks Are Better Than One

See this? Bet you can't hack it!

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Two-Headed Hard Drive Thwarts Internet Crackers

by Dave Murphy
ISSN 1535-3613

A new hard drive technology should thwart online crackers bent on attacking or defacing Web sites. A Japanese company, Scarabs, has announced a two-headed hard disk format that prevents published data from being changed by unauthorized users.

The new hard disk has two heads: one read-only(RO), the other read-write (RW). The RO disk is accessible to the Web, the RW disk is accessible only via a separate cable connected to a local PC. Data administrators can update the data on the RW disk, which in turn updates the RO or public disk. No access to the RO disk, other than reading the data, is available.

Using SCSI As An Alternative

Scarabs is also testing an alternative technology, using two SCSI (Small Computer System Interface) disk controllers to manage access to separate hard disks. One controller would allow RW access to a disk, the other would restrict access to RO operations. As in the first technology, the RW disk is the only interface to the RO, the public, disk.

Dave's Opinion

The Scarabs technicians report the two technologies are a bit complicated, but I think the theory is sound. By restricting access to the Web site's drives to RO operations, all unauthorized modifications should be prevented. I'm going to keep my eye on this technology: it's expected to be available within the year.

Call for Comments

What do you think? Leave your comments on the message center.

References

Scarabs
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updated July 22, 2002
http://dgl.com/itinfo/2002/it020722.html