By Heidi Yelk, electronic services librarian, Wisconsin State Law Library

Jan. 20, 2010 – USB flash drives – also known as thumb drives, jump drives, memory sticks – are a convenient way to store data and take files with you. But, like anything small and portable, these drives are easy to misplace or lose. The prospect of losing a drive may make you wonder about password protection. What are the options for secure USB drives?

If you routinely carry sensitive information on a flash drive, it makes sense to invest in one that offers encryption or password protection. These drives are more expensive. IronKey drives, for example, cost $80 - $300. Another option is to download a password protection program onto a USB drive that doesn’t come with that feature. TrueCrypt, PGP, and Password Safe are some of the free or low-cost options available.

However, if you don’t want to invest in an encrypted drive or mess with downloading a new program, consider using the Microsoft Windows compressed zipped folder feature, which offers password protection. Here’s how:

1. Choose a file or folder on your USB drive that you want to protect with a password.

2. Right mouse click on the file or folder icon, choose “Send to” and from that menu, choose “Compressed (zipped) folder.” This will create a folder labeled with the same name as the file or folder you just chose.

3. Double click on the new zipped folder to open it.

4. From the “File” menu at the top, choose “add a password.”

5. Enter a password for the file.

Using this method, you can password protect some or all files on a USB drive.

This article was published in the January issue of WSSL @ Your Service, published by the Wisconsin State Law Library.