From frequently reading the boards, it seems that a great many users do backups with flash drives or what some refer to as thumb drives. It also seems like many users make only one backup, which is extremely unsafe. But, on this tip or white paper, I will cover encryption in detail.
If the AC folder or the databases are copied to a flash drive and taken home, there are key risks involved not to mention HIPAA non-compliance. Unless you take home the automatically encrypted files which are made by AC's offline backup, you are probably taking home the folder, as is, or the .mdb databases as is. The words "Amazing Charts" is found in quite a few places, and is always found on the AmazingCharts.mdb database. At the very least, rename these files to hamburgers or Shrek. And, do not have anything in the folder with the words Amazing Charts. It is rather simple to make the jump to
www.amazingcharts.com and downloading the program for the file. The files can rather can be opened without AC as well.
But, one really should be using encryption. There are many freeware and shareware encryption programs out there. I have looked at most, and I have come across a free one (donations accepted), and it is excellent. It is called TrueCrypt and can be downloaded from
http://www.truecrypt.org/The nice thing about TrueCrypt is you can encrypt the entire flash drive, and then anything dragged or copied there is encrypted. It uses AES and Twofish encryption as well as other methods. One caution with TrueCrpt, it works very smoothly, but the pdf manual which directs the encryption setup should be read step by step carefully. It's straightforward if done step by step. You can, of course, encrypt external hard drives, etc.
Since I am on the subject, I can't resist recommending multiple backups. One backup is not good for a multitude of reasons. If a file is deleted and you find out about it ten days later, you have backed up data without the file. You don't really want corrupt data either. Plus, if you lose your data on Wednesday and go to Tuesday's backup, you may find it isn't accessible or workable. It's nice to have a Monday to go back to. Remember, this data is your lifeline.
If you bring a flash drive to work and then bring it home, it is at work all day and doesn't help in the case of a physical disaster. One method would be to have two and bring one to work, copy the data, then bring it home and bring number two to work the following day. With the price of flash drives, you could probably pick up five 1 GB flash drives for $200 if not less. That would give you one for Monday through Friday. Personally, I think if this is your only system, it's not nearly good enough, but it's better than one.
Another great discovery that I found today is IronKey. It is flat out incredible. It runs $79.00 for 1 GB, which is more than enough for the usual less than 100 MB Amazing Charts folder. This little flash drive is better than military this and better than military that according to its online data. I love the part where it states that ten incorrect password tries in a row, and it will self-destruct. No, it actually does. It shows it bursting into flames, but it is joking. But, the insides do implode. It has a connection to the Internet where all the data can be stored. I will let you listen to the three-minute movie yourself.
www.ironkey.com
