Lacie Safe Mobile Hard Drive

Keep your data safe from prying eyes

Lacie is the latest manufacturer to leap on the biometric bandwagon and its Safe Mobile Hard Drive could come in handy for business users who are concerned about the security of their data.

Our review unit had a capacity of 80GB, but there’s a 40GB model available as well. Its compact, silvery-grey design looks very much like any ordinary portable hard disk. However, the drive’s top panel has a small scanner built into it, which allows it to scan the fingerprints of people using the drive and deny access to unauthorised users.

Installation is relatively straightforward, apart from the fact that you may need to use two separate USB cables to connect it to your PC in order to supply adequate power for the disk and scanning mechanism. This will vary from PC to PC – our desktop model managed to provide adequate power over just one USB cable, while a laptop required two cables.

With the drive up and running, all that remains is to install the Safe software, which then prompts you to pass your finger over the scanner so that it can scan and store the image of your fingerprint.

The first person to use the Safe drive is designated as the drive’s administrator. The administrator can then create profiles for up to 10 additional users, who can all have their own fingerprints scanned.

This effectively allows business users to limit access to a small group of people in one particular department or who may be working on a sensitive project.

We were a bit sceptical at first, thinking the drive was little more than a gimmick, but it worked perfectly well during our tests and certainly provides an extra level of security for business users who need to protect important data.