Computer Magazines - Lenovo ThinkPad Edge 13

by Cisco Cheng

Lenovo's ThinkPad series has clung to the same corporate look longer than any other in the business, but it could only go so long before customers get the impression that they're buying the same thing over and over again. So how do you redesign something that's considered blasphemy to redesign? Well, you take baby steps. Case in point: the Lenovo ThinkPad Edge 13 ($899 direct). In terms of industrial design, the ThinkPad Edge 13 is a compelling makeover for a laptop that bears the sacred ThinkPad seal. It even dared to alter the prized keyboard while keeping its signature Trackpoint and mouse buttons. As a category, the Edge 13 is a CULV laptop, meaning it carries Intel's ultra low voltage processor and gets you at least 7 hours of battery life. It's a decent entry-level laptop for a small business.

Design
Aside from the black color and the familiar ThinkPad logo, the Edge 13 bears little resemblance to the ThinkPad X301. The lid is trimmed with silver and it's glossy, destined to be laden with finger prints and smudges. A matted black and a red version will be available as well, paring down the unsightly marks. Overall, though, the new design lacks the luxurious appeal of aluminum metals, which can be found in lightweight laptops like the HP ProBook 5310m and ASUS UL30A-A1.

At 3.9 pounds, the Edge 13 weighs about the same as the ASUS UL30A-A1 (3.9 lbs) and HP 5310m (3.8 lbs). The Acer Aspire Timeline AS3810T (3.6 lbs) and Dell Vostro V13 (3.6 lbs) are lighter and measure less than an inch thick (the Edge 13's dimensions are slightly thicker at 12.9-by-9-by-1.1 inches, HWD). A 13-inch widescreen is the common denominator among this group, and the one on the Edge 13 is generic at best in that its resolution tops out at 1,366-by-768—like the rest of them. Upgrading to a class-act like the Lenovo ThinkPad X301, on the other hand, bumps the maximum resolution to 1,440-by-900.

Features
The keyboard is perhaps the ThinkPad's most celebrated feature, and changing it would be considered sacrilegious to some. Apparently, that's exactly what Lenovo did with the Edge line, although the actual typing experience might surprise you. The Edge 13 adopts the island-style layout made popular by the Apple MacBook Pro 13-inch, and used in consumer ultra-low voltage (CULV) CPU-equipped laptops like the Acer AS3810T and ASUS UL30A-1—and it's the best one yet.

The keys are isolated from one other, but they're large enough so that it doesn't feel like typing on little squares. Each key cap is curved and raised high enough so that the ThinkPad "feeling" is still there, once you get past the new look. The transition is made even easier by bringing over the original ThinkPad navigating experience. So, yes, the signature red pointing stick and soft mouse buttons are present, as well as the additional touchpad and another pair of mouse buttons.

The Edge 13's feature set isn't better or worse than any other CULV or small business laptop. Like its peers, it doesn't have an internal optical drive, which isn't necessarily a flaw. I'm a big proponent of getting of rid it in lightweight form factors. The Lenovo X301, if you choose to upgrade, has one built-in. The three USB ports, VGA, Ethernet, and multimedia card reader are all present. The HDMI-port lets users stream their presentations and videos to an external display that supports the format. It also has an option for WiMax through Intel, and embedded 3G, with Qualcomm's Gobi wireless.

Performance
The Edge 13 is one of the few laptops that are not launching with Intel's latest "Arrandale" platform, which will have processor names like Core i7, Core i5, and Core i3. Instead, it uses a previous generation CULV platform, complete with an Intel Core 2 Duo SU7300 (1.3GHz), 4GB of RAM, and integrated graphics. These processors are slightly slower, but what you lose in speed, you'll gain back in battery efficiency. The UL30A-A1, Dell Vostro V13, and Acer Timeline AS3810T follow the same processor principles, as they use similar Ultra Low Voltage processors.

The Edge 13 fared the worst in PCMark Vantage, an overall performance benchmark test, scoring just 2,338 points. Its video encoding and Cinebench R10 scores were in line with that of the ASUS UL30A-A1, but trailed the Acer AS3810T by a significant margin. The ProBook 5310m, on the other hand, uses a standard voltage processor (Intel Core 2 Duo SP9300), so it took the middle ground, favoring both speed and battery life and therefore dominated in speed tests.

With CULV laptops, battery life is the biggest claim to fame. Although the Edge 13's 63WH (6-cell) scored almost 7 hours (6:58) in MobileMark 2007 tests, it came up well short against the ASUS UL30A-A1 (10:27) and ASUS A3810T (8:39). The Edge 13 did beat the 5310m (5:18), though, since it uses a more energy efficient processor and a bigger battery.

Since Lenovo's acquisition of the ThinkPad brand, it hasn't launched another line with the ThinkPad moniker until now. The ThinkPad Edge 13 lives up to its namesake's typing and navigating experience, though its shiny plastics aren't as classy as the metals found in the HP ProBook 5310m and the Asus UL30A-A1. And while 7 hours of battery life is commendable, other CULVs are scoring in the 8-10 hour range and selling for less. It's still a solid buy, though, if you can snag it for less than its listed price ($899). Otherwise, go with the HP 5310m or ASUS UL30A-A1.

Computer Magazines - Sony VAIO VPC-L117FX/B

Editors' Note: The Sony VAIO VPC-L117FX/B initial run of units has sold out. According to Sony, the system will be available once again in Feburary 2010.

by Joel Santo Domingo

Among the all in one all-in-one desktop PC, the Sony VAIO VPC-L117FX/B ($2,000 list) is certainly one of the best looking. It has the look of a 24-inch HDTV, an intentional design choice. Inside that sexy shell is the heart of a power user's PC: quad-core Intel processor, 6GB of memory, 1TB hard drive, Blu-ray burner, and a decent Nvidia graphics card. Placement in the kitchen, den, home office, and living room come to mind, but like its Sony VAIO all in one predecessors, it will even work in the most design critical room in the house: the bedroom.

Design
The VAIO VPC-L117FX/B looks like it could be a Sony Bravia HDTV. That is one of its greatest strengths, since it can blend in anywhere a smaller (20- to 36-inch) HDTV fits. It can even replace a TV in the bedroom, since it has a built-in Blu-ray drive, ATSC tuner, and HDMI-in ports. Viewing Blu-ray videos on the VAIO give you that "view through a window" effect that makes it seem like the action is happening on the other side of the display glass. We tested the system with films made before (Coming to America, The Warriors) and after the advent of CGI (Star Trek, Mission Impossible II). All of the films looked great. The picture is vivid, accurate, and noise-free. The HDMI-in port lets you connect a game system like a Sony Playstation 3 or a set-top box like the one from you cable TV company. The built-in tuner grabs over the air HDTV signals and displays them in Windows 7's built-in Media Center interface. There's a slot built into the base of the unit, so you can stow the wireless keyboard out of the way when you're not using it, and the keyboard and mouse can easily reach a bed or couch 10 to 15 feet away. The system is wall mountable with a kit you can buy separately.

The all-in-one comes with five USB ports, a FireWire/i.Link port, and that 24-inch 1,920 by 1,080 resolution screen (which is true 1080p HD). This is truly a power-users' system, and it better be one for $2,000. The system also comes with 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi and an IR remote control so you can work almost completely wireless.

Features
The system's touchscreen is responsive, though it takes a few seconds for your finger to learn exactly where to point to get the screen to recognize your commands. The HP TouchSmart systems are a little more forgiving with finger placement, but both the Sony and HP all in one PC's screens are multi-touch enabled and can use standard Windows 7 touch command functions like swipe, flick, pinch, and rotate. The system's quad-core processor makes the Sony VPC-L117FX/B just a little more responsive than the TouchSmart 600, but you're unlikely to notice the difference unless you have the two side by side. Aside from the usual Windows 7 apps, the VAIO VPC-L117FX/B comes with VAIO Media Gallery, a unified multimedia viewing interface that lets you quickly view all your music, photos, and videos on a variety of formats, including neat calendar-organized formats. This serves a range of users from the "messy but organized" types to the obsessive compulsives that have to have their photos organized by time stamps. Media Gallery allows you to group photos arbitrarily or via searchable criteria; then you can create a quick slideshow with a couple of touches, then export to VAIO Movie Story. VAIO Movie Story is a quick way to create well, if not edited, then concatenated home movie made of your pictures, clips from your digital camera, and clips from your cell phone. Movie Story can either use music you choose, or it will check the videos with an algorithm and automatically suggest or add music. You can then burn the resulting movie to DVD or Blu-ray disc, save the file in a variety of media formats (including MPEG-2, MP4, etc.), or export your file to a Sony Media device like a PSP or a Mylo. I'd like to see an integrated export to iTunes/iPod or better yet an export to Facebook or Youtube, but you could of course do that manually after you create a file.

The VAIO VPC-L117FX/B comes with Google's Chrome as its default browser, but like all Windows 7 PCs, it also comes with Internet Explorer 8. I found that touch navigation works better in IE8, since I couldn't scroll slowly in Chrome—it only recognized flick commands like page forward/back and page up/down. Scrolling up and down in IE8 using finger gestures was smooth and worked as expected. I'm sure Google will improve the interface over time, but for now IE8 is the better touch-enabled browser on the VAIO.

Aside from the useful software above, there's very little in the way of bloatware on the VAIO VPC-L117FX/B. There's a copy of Microsoft Works, which is useful. Then there's an installer for a 60-day trial of Microsoft Office, which is the right way to both satisfy Microsoft's agreements with Sony, and to avoid the dreaded "pre-installed Office" syndrome. Likewise, there's a link to Quicken's Website for offers on QuickBooks and Quicken, but you have to download and install them. Believe me, this is a good thing. You don't have to install Office or Quickbooks unless you want to, so there's nothing to clean up and therefore no stray .DLL files or leftover detritus to muck up your hard drive. If there's any drawback to the Sony VAIO Media software, it's that it's not as modular as HP's TouchSmart interface, with its widgets and iPod Touch-style apps. On the other hand, VAIO Media Gallery and Movie Story are some of the most intuitive and easiest to use pack-in multimedia apps outside of Apple's iLife (iMovie, iDVD, etc.).

Performance
Sony VAIO VPC-L117FX/B The VAIO VPC-L117FX/B's performance is very good, thanks to its Intel Core 2 Quad 8400S processor and Nvidia GeForce GT 240M graphics, though it's tied for the class leader in only one of our standard benchmark tests. The VAIO is speedy at the PhotoShop CS4 test with a class-leading 1 minute 39 seconds, tied with the Gateway One ZX6810-01. It's also only one second behind the Gateway FX6810-01 at the Windows Media Encoder test (43 seconds), which makes the VAIO VPC-L117FX/B an excellent choice for the multimedia enthusiast. It's other scores are competitive in the field of multimedia all in one desktops, including the dual-core powered Apple iMac 27-inch (Core 2 Duo), Lenovo IdeaCentre A600 (3011-4BU), and the Editor's Choice HP TouchSmart 600-1055 PC. The VAIO VPC-L117FX/B can be used for light gaming: it played World in Conflict at a smooth 39 frames per second (fps), but is a little too slow playing Crysis at our standard settings (30fps). If you push the quality levels and/or resolution down you can likely get a playable frame rate in Crysis. The GPU does help with programs like Microsoft's Virtual Earth and HD video playback from the web.

As a high-end all-in-one desktop PC, the Sony VAIO VPC-L117FX/B is a little pricey at about $2,000, but you can just about rationalize the added expense if you consider the system has one of the best quality screens in the business, Blu-ray burner (as opposed to just a player for the Lenovo A600 and HP TouchSmart 600), and its looks more like an HDTV than a PC, unlike the iMac, Gateway One, Lenovo IdeaCentre, and HP TouchSmart. That said, these other four are a lot less expensive, especially in the case of the Gateway One and Lenovo A600 (both $1,399 list). The Gateway One is the performance leader overall, with a speedy Solid State Drive (SSD) helping its quad-core processor take five wins out of the seven benchmark tests. However, the Editor's Choice winning HP TouchSmart 600-1055 has the most polished implementation of touch technology in Windows 7, along with the best bang for the buck ($1,599 list) out of all the multimedia all in ones. The Sony VAIO VPC-L117FX/B is a "better quality" choice if you're willing to spend the bucks, but you'd have to be a individual who's really hard to please to justify an almost $500 price premium.

Innovative Technique Can Spot Errors in Key Technological Systems; Early Alerts for Satellites, Weather Instruments

An innovative computational technique that draws on statistics, imaging and other disciplines has the capability to detect errors in sensitive technological systems ranging from satellites to weather instruments.

The patented technique, known as the Intelligent Outlier Detection Algorithm, or IODA, is described this month in the Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology.

IODA offers the potential to alert operators to faulty readings or other problems associated with failing sensors. If sensors malfunction and begin transmitting bad data, computers programmed with the algorithm could identify the problem and isolate that bad data.

IODA was developed by researchers at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) and the University of Colorado at Boulder (CU).

The National Science Foundation (NSF), NCAR's sponsor, funded the research. "This technology will have broad applicability in many new areas," says Steve Nelson, NSF program director for NCAR.

The developers of the algorithm say its principles can eventually be used in a vast range of technological settings, including cars and other transportation systems, power plants, satellites and space exploration, and data from radars and other observing instruments.

"This could, at least in theory, enable operators to keep a system performing even while it's failing," says Andrew Weekley, a software engineer at NCAR who led the algorithm development effort. "When a system starts to fail, it's absolutely critical to be able to control it as long as possible. That can make the difference between disaster or not."

IODA is designed to perform quality control on time series data--that is, data collected over time, such as wind speeds over the course of a month.

The algorithm, an expert system that draws on statistics, graph theory, image processing and decision trees, can be applied in cases where the correct assessment of data is critical, the incoming data are too numerous for a human to easily review, or the consequences of a sensor failure would be significant.

At present the algorithm consists of several thousand lines of a technical computing language known as MATLAB. The researchers may expand and translate it into a computer programming language such as C so it can be used for commercial purposes.

Ensuring the quality of incoming time series data is a priority for virtually any organization involved in complex operations. If sensors begin relaying inaccurate information, it can be highly challenging for personnel or automated systems to separate good data from bad, especially in cases involving enormous amounts of information.

Typically, to identify bad data, complex operations may rely on multiple sensors, as well as algorithms that characterize specific relationships among the data being collected, and identify failures when the data unexpectedly change.

A drawback in most of these algorithms, however, is they are designed for a particular type of time series and can fail catastrophically when applied to different types of data, especially in situations where there are numerous and sometimes subtle errors.

IODA, however, compares incoming data to common patterns of failure--an approach that can be applied broadly because it is independent of a specific sensor or measurement.

Weekley and co-authors took a new approach to the problem when they began developing IODA 10 years ago. Whereas existing methods treat the data as a function of time, Weekley conceived of an algorithm that treats the data as an image.

This approach mimics the way a person might look at a plot of data points to spot an inconsistency.

For example, if a person looked at a line drawn between points on a graph that represented morning temperatures rising from 50 to 70 degrees, and then spotted a place where that smooth line was broken, dipping precipitously because of numerous data points down at 10 degrees, the person would immediately suspect there was a bad sensor reading.

In cases where there are thousands or even millions of data points about temperature or other variables, pinpointing the bad ones can be more difficult.

But Weekley thought that a computer could be programmed to recognize common patterns of failure through image processing techniques.

Then, like a person eyeing data, the computer could identify problems with data points such as jumps and intermittency; view patterns in the data; and determine not only whether a particular datum is bad but also characterize how it is inaccurate.

"Our thought was to organize a sequence of data as an image and apply image processing techniques to identify a failure unambiguously," Weekley says. "We thought that, by using image processing, we could teach the system to detect inconsistencies, somewhat like a person would."

The research team came up with ways of arranging data points in a time series into clusters, both in a domain that represents the data points over time and in another domain known as delay space.

Delay space, which offers another way to detect differences in the data, is a technique that pairs a data point in the time series with the previous value.

Using the clusters from both the time domain and delay space, bad data are separated into their own cluster, clearly distinct from the cluster of accurate data. At the same time, IODA can calculate quality scores indicating if each individual data point is good or bad.

"I would say the approach we report in the paper is a radical departure from the usual techniques found in the time series literature," says Kent Goodrich, a CU mathematician and a co-author of the paper.

"The image processing and other techniques are not new, but the use of these images and techniques together in a time series application is new. IODA is able to characterize good and bad points very well in some commonly encountered situations."

When the research team tested IODA, they found it accurately isolated incorrect data in several cases.

For example, they applied the algorithm to wind readings from anemometers in Alaska that contained faulty errors due to a loose nut, which left the anemometers unable to consistently measure gusts in high-wind situations. The algorithm identified the bad readings, separating them into a series of clusters away from the good data.

"This technique has very broad implications," Weekley says. "Virtually all control systems rely on time series data at some level, and the ability to identify suspect data along with the possible failure is very useful in creating systems that are more robust.

"We think it is a powerful methodology that could be applied to almost all sequences of measurements that vary over time."

Computer Magazines - How To Build a Nettop Part 2

1)      Getting Started
Open the case and slide the cover off. The risers and power supply are included. The case does not come with a manual so you will have to download one off of the Antec website.

2)      Remove the Rack
This is where you will screw in your optical and hard disks. Put them aside in a safe place so you won't lose them.

3)      Insert the Motherboard
The CPU is already on the motherboard so unlike other build projects you will not need to install the CPU spread thermal paste and mount a cooling fan. 

4)	Wire the Motherboard It will be tight but wire up all of your motherboard connections now, because it will be harder when the rack is installed.

Computer Magazines - How To Build a Nettop Part 1

If you are thinking about building a second or third PC for your home, you can save money and energy by building a nettop. Here's how to do it.

Netbooks and nettops are one of the fastest growing segments of the PC landscape. Running on Atom or Neo processors, and meant for basic day-to-day computing tasks, they're a handy addition to any household. And with their lower energy consumption, these devices won't be adding a lot to your electricity bill.

So why build a nettop? Building a nettop is a much cheaper alternative to a full-scale desktop PC, particularly if you're looking for a system primarily to surf the Web. The CPU and motherboard alone we are using will only cost you $80 combined. And the brand new Intel Atom D510 processor (the first Pine Trail Atom processor) has the graphics (GPU) built right into the 1.66 GHz chip. The dual-core D510 also has hyperthreading, so it can theoretically handle up to 4 data streams at once. Not bad for $80.

The small form factor of a net top is definitely a plus if you are looking for an unobtrusive PC. Say you are looking for a PC for the kids or a small media center that you can place inside of your home theater console; this could work for you. It doesn't have an HDMI port, but you can easily add the nettop to you network and use it for all of your media files.

This particular nettop build also only needs a 60Watt power supply. That, added to its small form factor, makes it a good candidate for anyone wanting a more eco-friendly system. You will also save power with a 2.5-inch hard drive, the Western Digital 2.5-inch WD VelociRaptor, but that doesn't mean you have lose speed. It actually runs at a fast 7,200 rpm.

Now, there are some caveats to having a nettop. You won't be running the fastest processor out there, and you will be limited in the speed and amount of RAM you can use. In fact this particular build calls for DDR2 RAM, which is a generation behind in terms of memory. Lastly, you are currently limited to using the now ancient Windows XP operating system. But when saving money as well as the planet are high up on many people's list of priorities, a nettop is definitely worth considering. Read on to build one of your own.

Parts

Motherboard: Intel D510MO $80 List (processer included)
Processor: (1.66GHz) Intel Atom D510
Chassis: Antek ISK 300-65 $60 List
HDD: 300GB Western Digital 2.5" WD VelociRaptor $150
Optical Drive: Sony Optiarc Slim DVD drive $35
OS: Windows XP $110
Memory: 1GB, Crucial DDR2 $27

Evil Maid goes after TrueCrypt!

From time to time it’s good to take a break from all the ultra-low-level stuff, like e.g. chipset or TXT hacking, and do something simple, yet still important. Recently Alex Tereshkin and I got some spare time and we implemented the Evil Maid Attack against TrueCrypt system disk encryption in a form of a small bootable USB stick image that allows to perform the attack in an easy “plug-and-play” way. The whole infection process takes about 1 minute, and it’s well suited to be used by hotel maids.

The Attack

Let’s quickly recap the Evil Maid Attack. The scenario we consider is when somebody left an encrypted laptop e.g. in a hotel room. Let’s assume the laptop uses full disk encryption like e.g. this provided by TrueCrypt or PGP Whole Disk Encryption.

Many people believe, including some well known security experts, that it is advisable to fully power down your laptop when you use full disk encryption in order to prevent attacks via FireWire/PCMCIA or ”Coldboot” attacks.

So, let’s assume we have a reasonably paranoid user, that uses full disk encryption on his or her laptop, and also powers it down every time they leave it alone in a hotel room, or somewhere else.

Now, this is where our Evil Maid stick comes into play. All the attacker needs to do is to sneak into the user’s hotel room and boot the laptop from the Evil Maid USB Stick. After some 1-2 minutes, the target laptop’s gets infected with Evil Maid Sniffer that will record the disk encryption passphrase when the user enters it next time. As any smart user might have guessed already, this part is ideally suited to be performed by hotel maids, or people pretending to be them.

So, after our victim gets back to the hotel room and powers up his or her laptop, the passphrase will be recorded and e.g. stored somewhere on the disk, or maybe transmitted over the network (not implemented in current version).

Now we can safely steal/confiscate the user’s laptop, as we know how to decrypt it. End of story.

Quick Start

Download the USB image here. In order to “burn” the Evil Maid use the following commands on Linux (you need to be root to do dd):


dd if=evilmaidusb.img of=/dev/sdX


Where /dev/sdX should be replaced with the device representing your USB stick, e.g. /dev/sdb. Please be careful, as choosing a wrong device might result in damaging your hard disk or other media! Also, make sure to use the device representing the whole disk (e.g. /dev/sdb), rather than a disk partition (e.g. /dev/sdb1).

On Windows you would need to get a dd-like program, e.g. this one, and the command would look more or less like this one (depending on the actual dd implementation you use):


dd if=evilmaidusb.img of=\\?\Device\HarddiskX\Partition0 bs=1M


where HarddiskX should be replaced with the actual device the represents your stick.

After preparing the Evil Maid USB stick, you’re ready to test it against some TrueCrypt-encrypted laptop (more technically: a laptop that uses TrueCrypt system disk encryption). Just boot the laptop from the stick, confirm you want to run the tool (press ‘E’) and the TrueCrypt loader on your laptop should be infected.

Now, Evil Maid will be logging the passphrases provided during the boot time. To retrieve the recorded passphrase just boot again from the Evil Maid USB -- it should detect that the target is already infected and display the sniffed password.

The current implementation of Evil Maid always stores the last passphrase entered, assuming this is the correct one, in case the user entered the passphrase incorrectly at earlier attempts.

NOTE: It’s probably illegal to use Evil Maid to obtain password from other people without their consent. You should always obtain permission from other people before testing Evil Maid against their laptops!

CAUTION: The provided USB image and source code should be considered proof-of-concept only. Use this code at your own risk, and never run it against a production system. Invisible Things Lab cannot be held responsible for any potential damages this code or its derivates might cause.

How the Evil Maid USB works

The provided implementation is extremely simple. It first reads the first 63 sectors of the primary disk (/dev/sda) and checks (looking at the first sector) if the code there looks like a valid TrueCrypt loader. If it does, the rest of the code is unpacked (using gzip) and hooked. Evil Maid hooks the TC’s function that asks user for the passphrase, so that the hook records whatever passphrase is provided to this function. We also take care about adjusting some fields in the MBR, like the boot loader size and its checksum. After the hooking is done, the loader is packed again and written back to the disk.

You can get the source code for the Evil Maid infector .

Possible Workarounds

So, how should we protect against such Evil Maid attacks? There are a few approaches...

1. Protect your laptop when you leave it alone

Several months ago I had a discussion with one of the TrueCrypt developers about possible means of preventing the Evil Maid Attack, perhaps using TPM (see below). Our dialog went like this (reproduced here with permission from the TrueCrypt developer):

TrueCrypt Developer: We generally disregard "janitor" attacks since they inherently make the machine untrusted. We never consider the feasibility of hardware attacks; we simply have to assume the worst. After an attacker has "worked" with your hardware, you have to stop using it for sensitive data. It is impossible for TPM to prevent hardware attacks (for example, using hardware key loggers, which are readily available to average Joe users in computer shops, etc.)

Joanna Rutkowska: And how can you determine that the attacker have or have not "worked" with your hardware? Do you carry your laptop with you all the time?

TrueCrypt Developer: Given the scope of our product, how the user ensures physical security is not our problem. Anyway, to answer your question (as a side note), you could use e.g. a proper safety case with a proper lock (or, when you cannot have it with you, store it in a good strongbox).

Joanna Rutkowska: If I could arrange for a proper lock or an impenetrable strongbox, then why in the world should I need encryption?

TrueCrypt Developer: Your question was: "And how can you determine that the attacker has or has not worked with your hardware?" My answer was a good safety case or strongbox with a good lock. If you use it, then you will notice that the attacker has accessed your notebook inside (as the case or strongbox will be damaged and it cannot be replaced because you had the correct key with you). If the safety case or strongbox can be opened without getting damaged & unusable, then it's not a good safety case or strongbox. ;-)

That's a fair point, but this means that for the security of our data we must relay on the infeasibility to open our strongbox lock in a "clean" way, i.e. without visually damaging it. Plus it means we need to carry a good strongbox with us to any travel we go. I think we need a better solution...

Note that TrueCrypt authors do mention the possibility of physical attacks in the documentation:

If an attacker can physically access the computer hardware and you use it after the attacker has physically accessed it, then TrueCrypt may become unable to secure data on the computer. This is because the attacker may modify the hardware or attach a malicious hardware component to it (such as a hardware keystroke logger) that will capture the password or encryption key (e.g. when you mount a TrueCrypt volume) or otherwise compromise the security of the computer.

However, they do not explicitly warn users of a possibility of something as simple and cheap as the Evil Maid Attack. Sure, they write "or otherwise compromise the security of the computer", which does indeed cover e.g. the Evil Maid Attack, but my bet is that very few users would realize what it really means. The examples of physical attacks given in the documentation, e.g. modifying the hardware or attaching a malicious hardware, is something that most users would disregard as too expensive an attack to be afraid of. But note that our Evil Maid attack is an example of a “physical” attack, that doesn’t require any hardware modification and is extremely cheap.

Of course it is a valid point, that if we allow a possibility of a physical attack, then the attacker can e.g. install a hardware keylogger. But doing that is really not so easy as we discuss in the next paragraph. On the other hand, spending two minutes to boot the machine from an Evil Maid USB stick is just trivial and is very cheap (the price of the USB stick, plus the tip for the maid).

2. The Trusted Computing Approach

As explained a few months ago on this blog, a reasonably good solution against Evil Maid attack seems to be to take advantage of either static or dynamic root of trust offered by TPM. The first approach (SRTM) is what has been implemented in Vista Bitlocker. However Bitlocker doesn’t try to authenticate to the user (e.g. via displaying a custom picture shot by the user, with the picture decrypted using a key unsealed from a TPM), so it’s still possible to create a similar attack against Bitlocker, but with a bit different user experience. Namely the Evil Maid for Bitlocker would have to display a fake Bitlocker prompt (that could be identical to the real Bitlocker prompt), but after obtaining a correct password from the user Evil Maid would not be able to pass the execution to the real Bitlocker code, as the SRTM chain will be broken. Instead, Evil Maid would have to pretend that the password was wrong, uninstall itself, and then reboot the platform. Thus, a Bitlocker user that is confident that he or she entered the correct password, but the OS didn’t boot correctly, should destroy the laptop.

The dynamic root of trust approach (DRTM) is possible thanks to Intel TXT technology, but currently there is no full disk encryption software that would make use of it. One can try to implement it using Intel’s tboot and some Linux disk encryption, e.g. LUKS.

Please also note that even if we assume somebody “cracked” the TPM chip (e.g. using an electron microscope, or NSA backdoor), that doesn’t mean this person can automatically get access to the encrypted disk contents. This is not the case, as the TPM is used only for ensuring trusted boot. After cracking the TPM, the attacker would still have to mount an Evil Maid attack in order to obtain the passphrase or key. Without TPM this attack is always possible.

Are those trusted computing-based approaches 100% foolproof? Of course not. As signalized in the previous paragraph, if an attacker was able to mount a hardware-based keylogger into your laptop (which is non-trivial, but possible), then the attacker would be able to capture your passphrase regardless of the trusted boot. A user can prevent such an attack by using two-factor authentication (RSA challenge-response implemented in a USB token) or e.g. one-time passwords, so that there is no benefit for the attacker to capture the keystrokes. But the attacker might go to the extreme and e.g. replace the DRAM, or even the CPU with malicious DRAM or CPU that would sniff and store the decryption key for later access. We’re talking here about attack that very few entities can probably afford (think NSA), but nevertheless they are theoretically possible. (Note that an attack with inserting a malicious PCI device that would try to sniff the key using DMA can be prevented using TXT+VT-d technology).

However, just because the NSA can theoretically replace your CPU with a malicious one, doesn’t mean TPM-based solutions are useless. As for the great majority of other people that do not happen to be on the Terrorist Top 10, these represent a reasonable solution that could prevent Evil Maid attacks, and, when combined with a proper two-factor authentication, also simple hardware based attacks, e.g. keylogger, cameras, remote keystroke sniffing using laser, etc. I really cannot think of a more reasonable solution here.

3. The Poor Man’s Solution

Personally I would love to see TrueCrypt implementing TPM-based trusted boot for its loader, but, well, what can I do? Keep bothering TrueCrypt developers with Evil Maid attacks and hope they will eventually consider implementing TPM support...

So, in the meantime we have come up with a temporary poor man’s solution that we use at our lab. We call it Disk Hasher. It’s a bootable Linux-based USB stick that can be configured in quite a flexible way to calculate hashes of selected disk sectors and partitions. The correct hashes are stored also on the stick (of course everything is encrypted with a custom laptop-specific passphrase). We use this stick to verify the unencrypted portions of our laptops (typically the first 63 sectors of sda, and also the whole /boot partition in case of Linux-based laptops where we use LUKS/dm-crypt).

Of course there are many problems with such a solution. E.g. somebody who can get access to my Disk Hasher USB (e.g. when I’m in a swimming pool), can infect it in such a way that it would report correct hashes, even though the disk of my laptop would be “evilmaided”...

Another problem with Disk Hasher solution is that it only looks at the disk, but cannot validate e.g. the BIOS. So if the attacker found a way to bypass the BIOS reflashing protection on my laptop, then he or she can install a rootkit there that would sniff my passphrase or the decryption key (in case I used one time passwords).

Nevertheless, our Disk Hasher stick seems like a reasonable solution and we use it often internally at ITL to validate our laptops. In fact this is the most we can do, if we want to use TrueCrypt, PGP WDE, or LUKS/dm-crypt.

FAQ

Q: Is this Evil Maid Attack some l33t new h4ck?

Nope, the concept behind the Evil Maid Attack is neither new, nor l33t in any way.

Q: So, why did you write it?

Because we believe it demonstrates an important problem, and we would like more attention to be paid in the industry to solving it.

Q: I’m using two-factor authentication, am I protected against EM?

While a two-factor authentication or one time passwords are generally a good idea (e.g. they can prevent various keylogger attacks), they alone do not provide protection from Evil Maid-like attacks, because the attacker might modify his or her sniffer to look for the final decryption key (that would be calculated after the 2-factor authentication completes).

Q: How is Evil Maid different from Stoned-Bootkit?

The Stoned Bootkit, released a few months ago by an individual describing himself as “Software Dev. Guru in Vienna”, is also claimed to be capable of "bypassing TrueCrypt", which we take to mean a capability to sniff TC's passphrases or keys. Still, the biggest difference between Stoned Bootkit and Evil Maid USB is that in case of our attack you don’t need to start the victim's OS in order to install Evil Maid, all you need to do is to boot from a USB stick, wait about 1 minute for the minimal Linux to start, and then press ‘E’, wait some 2 more seconds, and you’re done. With the Stoned Bootkit, according to the author’s description, you need to get admin access to the target OS in order to install it, so you either need to know the Windows admin password first, or use some exploit to get the installer executing on the target OS. Alternatively, you can install it from a bootable Windows CD, but this, according to the author, works only against unencrypted volumes, so no use in case of TrueCrypt compromise.

Q: I've disabled boot from USB in BIOS and my BIOS is password protected, am I protected against EM?

No. Taking out your HDD, hooking it up to a USB enclosure case and later installing it back to your laptop increases the attack time by some 5-15 minutes at most. A maid has to carry her own laptop to do this though.

Q: What about using a HDD with built-in hardware-based encryption?

We haven’t tested such encryption systems, so we don’t know. There are many open questions here: how is the passphrase obtained from the user? Using software stored on the disk or in the BIOS? If on the disk, is this portion of disk made read-only? If so, does it mean it is non-updatable? Even if it is truly read-only, if the attacker can reflash the BIOS, then he or she can install a passphrase sniffer there in the BIOS. Of course that would make the attack non-trivial and much more expensive than the original Evil Maid USB we presented here.

Q: Which TrueCrypt versions are supported by the current Evil Maid USB?

We have tested our Evil Maid USB against TrueCrypt versions 6.0a - 6.2a (the latest version currently available). Of course, if the “shape” of the TrueCrypt loader changed dramatically in the future, then Evil Maid USB would require updating.

Q: Why did you choose TrueCrypt and not some other product?

Because we believe TrueCrypt is a great product, we use it often in our lab, and we would love to see it getting some better protection against such attacks.

Q: Why there is no TPM support in TrueCrypt?

The TrueCrypt Foundation published official generalized response to TPM-related feature requests .

Acknowledgments

Thanks to the ennead@truecrypt.org for all the polemics we had which allowed me to better gather my thoughts on the topic. The same thanks to Alex and Rafal, for all the polemics I have had with them (it's customary for ITL to spend a lot of time finding bugs in each other's reasoning).

Another TXT Attack

Earlier this year our team has presented an attack against Intel TXT that exploited a design problem with SMM mode being over privileged on PC platforms and able to interfere with the SENTER instruction. The Intel response was two-fold: to patch the SMM implementation bugs we used for the attack (this patch was for both the NVACPI SMM attacks, as well as for the SMM caching attack), and also to start (intensify?) working on STM specification, that is, we heard, planned to be published sometime in the near future. STM is a thin hypervisor concept that is supposed to provide protection against (potentially) malicious SMMs.

Today we present a totally different attack that allows an attacker to trick the SENTER instruction into misconfiguring the VT-d engine, so that it doesn’t protect the newly loaded hypervisor or kernel. This attack exploits an implementation flaw in a SINIT AC module. This new attack also allows for full TXT circumvention, using a software-only attack. This attack doesn't require any SMM bugs to succeed and is totally independent from the previous one.

The advisory published by Intel today can be found here.

Enjoy.

Computer Tips & Tricks - BIOS Settings & Configuration

Depending on the type of BIOS you are use. There are various possibilities in the information is not included which may be located / stored in the memory or the BIOS ROM. Some settings that are / listed here may not be there in your personal computer.

Before changing any settings in the BIOS in your computer, you first need to write down all original values which are found in the settings and save them in a safe place because you maybe will need it again. It is a normal for the computer to "crash" when a setting in the BIOS is changed. However, for computers equipped with the new BIOS, this is not a problem because the user can choose the original setting or choose option "Load BIOS default" in the settings. This will cause the computer to use the original setting on minimum stage so that the computer can run / operate.

Most BIOS contains Utilities for hard disk "hard disk" which is called "Low Level Formatting." Most of the IDE / ATA or SCSI drivers which are paired on each computer after the year 1992 or after that will damage because using this feature. This Utility are only created to work with MFM and RLL hard drive which are used in 1980 until 1992.

Basic Computer Tips - Part 3

Disable Autorun Function in your Computer

Most CD-ROM that sale is equipped with autorun.inf file. Your computer will run all command that being found in the file.

If you do not want your computer run that program automatically, there are two steps:

First step:

Press Shift Button on keyboard when you insert the CD-ROM into CD device.
Second Steps:

1. Go to Start Button> Setting> System> Device Manager.
2. Click on “+” beside CD-ROM picture.
3. Click on the CD-ROM name. Example, MyCD.
4. Click on properties option below.
5. Click setting. Uncheck the “Auto Insert Notification”.
6. After that, your computer will not run any program from CD-ROM automatically.

How to Make Your Computer Restart Faster

If you just want to restart windows and not the whole computer. Just press Shift key and press the restart.

Delete Unwanted Files

There is more kind of file in our computer. However, beware! Do not delete the files at your will.

Among the files that can be delete is temporary file and backup files.

Use Find command, type *.tmp deletes all listed file.

Repeat steps above with type *.bak and then delete the file listed.

Basic Computer Tips - Part 2

MICROSOFT PLUS

If you want to add your computer speed, I’m recommends you don’t use Microsoft Plus as an additional or accessories. This program only will make your computer slow. Even if your computer looks interesting, actually your computer process is slow.

BACKGROUND SETTING

You can fetish your computer space memory if you set up your background picture to “none”. This because the background picture is using memory source is quite large.

COLOR SETTING

Make sure that you already set the suitable color setting. If your monitor and display cardis able accommodate 1024 by 768 resolution, why you not using it. It’s adequate if the color is set to 8 bit only.

OPTIMIZE THE RAM MEMORY USAGE

RAM is one of factor that make fast a process in the computer. If your computer has a little bit memory space, software in computer will running and operated slowly. You need to know how to using your RAM better. Among the step to fetish your RAM so can be using by important programs is with removing all unwanted software which is in the startup folder. The wallpaper that you have uses also using large memory space. Try to set to “none”.

MAKE THE PROCESS FAST DURING SURFING INTERNET.

If you want get access faster while in the internet. You can set your browser not to display graphic. This is because graphic files are larger than a text. Usually, this command can be set up into option box every browser. However, it also depends on the type of your browser.

Basic Computer Tips – Part 1

ADVANCED CMOS SETUP
Before we step into the "advanced chipset setup” there are several interesting things which is need be considered about CMOS Setup. I will introduce it to you so that you know what need to do it.

Internal Cache Memory
"The internal cache" is an internal memory area in the CPU (Central Processing Unit). This kinf of memory also identified as “L1 Cache” and it is faster than external cache memory.

Suggestion: Set this option to “Disable” except if you want to slow down your computer 15 percent.

External Cache Memory

"The external cache memory" also identified as external memory among CPU and bus system where fast memory located to save command that is always request. Most of computer which is using Pentium CPU is has weather 256K or 512K internal memory. There is also some CPU Pentium II, which are can accommodate until 1MB external memory. External memory also identified as L2 Cache.

Suggestion: Set this option to “Enable”

TEMPORARY INTERNET FILES
Do you know that every time you surf internet, every file that you open will saved into windows folder which is called a “temporary internet files”. If you deleted these files, your hard drive space will be able to be fetish. However, if you trying to enter the webpage that you have been enter before this, the process will be slow because your browser has to download the entire file again. To make fast you in the internet is you just need to leave all the files.

If you use Netscape as your browser, Try to find in the folder which is called “cache” which are located in the same folder with browser program that you has been saved. If you are not sure, where the file that you are download is located try to find into folder that are explain.

Comprehensive list of Windows XP Keyboard Shortcuts

Comprehensive list of Windows XP Keyboard Shortcuts

Many functions and tasks can be quickly completed using keyboard shortcuts. These save time and resources because thet eliminate the need for a windows dialog box, or a user interface to load. Once you have mastered the 2 finger shortcuts, you'll see why so many computer experts prefer them.

Start slow, by using 1 or tw, and shortly, you'll be using them more and more.

Here is a of some of the most common Windows XP keyboard shortcuts:

ALT+- (ALT+hyphen) Displays the Multiple Document Interface (MDI) child window's System menu

ALT+ENTER View properties for the selected item

ALT+ESC Cycle through items in the order they were opened

ALT+F4 Close the active item, or quit the active program

ALT+SPACEBAR Display the System menu for the active window

ALT+TAB Switch between open items

ALT+Underlined letter Display the corresponding menu

BACKSPACE View the folder one level up in My Computer or Windows Explorer

CTRL+A Select all

CTRL+B Bold

CTRL+C Copy

CTRL+I Italics

CTRL+O Open an item

CTRL+U Underline

CTRL+V Paste

CTRL+X Cut

CTRL+Z Undo

CTRL+F4 Close the active document

CTRL while dragging Copy selected item

CTRL+SHIFT while dragging Create shortcut to selected iteM

CTRL+RIGHT ARROW Move the insertion point to the beginning of the next word

CTRL+LEFT ARROW Move the insertion point to the beginning of the previous word

CTRL+DOWN ARROW Move the insertion point to the beginning of the next paragraph

CTRL+UP ARROW Move the insertion point to the beginning of the previous paragraph

SHIFT+DELETE Delete selected item permanently without placing the item in the Recycle Bin

ESC Cancel the current task

F1 Displays Help

F2 Rename selected item

F3 Search for a file or folder

F4 Display the Address bar list in My Computer or Windows Explorer

F5 Refresh the active window

F6 Cycle through screen elements in a window or on the desktop

F10 Activate the menu bar in the active program

SHIFT+F10 Display the shortcut menu for the selected item

CTRL+ESC Display the Start menu

SHIFT+CTRL+ESC Launches Task Manager

SHIFT when you insert a CD Prevent the CD from automatically playing

WIN Display or hide the Start menu

WIN+BREAK Display the System Properties dialog box

WIN+D Minimizes all Windows and shows the Desktop

WIN+E Open Windows Explorer

WIN+F Search for a file or folder

WIN+F+CTRL Search for computers

WIN+L Locks the desktop

WIN+M Minimize or restore all windows

WIN+R Open the Run dialog box

WIN+TAB Switch between open items

Basic Computer Tips - Part 6

Print A File Quickly

The easier step to print a document without open the document is open the Explorer and click and bring the file to the Printer icon.

Empty Document Menu

To empty Documents menu, Right click on the Taskbar and choose Properties. And then choose Start Menu Program and click Clear button and Documents Menu, then click OK.

Obatin the Start Menu Using a Keyboard

To obtain Start Menu with a Keyboard, just press CTRL+ESC simultaneously

Open File Quickly

If you had open Wordpad or Word 7.0, you only need to open Explorer and choose text file that you want. Then click the file without release it to WordPad or Word 7.0 “title bar”. The file will open.

Cleaning The Screen

To clean up your screen from unused icon like Microsoft Network and My Briefcase, just click the icon and bring it to Recycle Bin icon.

The Things That You Need To Know About File

Every file that exist in computer is has a following characteristic that you need to know.

1. The file name. i.e user.dat
2. The file size. i.e 145kb
3. The file time created. i.e 10.45AM
4. The file date created. i.e 10/12/98
5. “Attribute”. I.e Read Only, Hidden, Archieve, System.

Save File Format as PDF

If you’re trying to do left click on file that has a PDF connection, Acrobat Readers will open it for you. However, it does only will allow you to read and print it but not allow you to save it. To complete it is with right click on link and choose “Save Target As”. That’s all.

Basic Computer Tips - Part 5

Go to Background Properties Quickly

You just need right click on the background and get properties option. You will can go to display properties.

Empty the Document on the Start Button

Click on the start button, choose settings>taskbar and Start menu>programs>clear. The entire document that recently opens will be empty.

Using Program Manager as Explorer

Click on the start button. Click Run. Type “sysedit”. Get System.ini file. Go to Boot part. Replace shell=exploere.exe with shell=winfile.exe.
Then Restart your computer.

After your computer start, your computer will use the program manager and not the explorer.

Evading from typing during "CAPS LOCK" ON

You can create warning beep as your sign when you’re activate the “CAPS LOCK” accidentally. To do that:-

1. Click on button Start>Settings>Control Panel.
2. Double click on option "Accessibility Options".
3. On the "Keyboard", mark the "Use ToggleKeys" box.
4. Click on "General".
5. In the option "Automatic reset", uncheck the box "Turn off accessibility features".
6. Click OK.

Now, when CAPS LOCK, NUM LOCK or SCROLL LOCK keys is activated, computer will give a warning with issue a beep sound. Computer will issue a tone sounds a bit low during the power released. Listening tone beeps rather high will help you stopfrom typing because there are has an erratum.

How to go to Windows Explorer

The first step, Click Start button and choose Programs. And then choose Windows Explorer.

Second step, Click My Computer icon twice and press Shift key.
Third Step, go to file windows side and double click and press Shift key.

DELETE FILE PERMANENTLY.

Usually if you delete some file its will saved into the Recycle Bin. If you want to remove it permanently, just click the file ahead and bring to Recycle Bin while press Shift key or press Shift and Delete simultaneously after choosing a file which is want to be deleted.

Basic Computer Tips – Part 4

Using Refill Ink

If your ink jet printer has run out ink, you not need buy the new ink together with catrige. Otherwise you may get the refill ink. Make sure first the kind of printer that you use. Then go to the nearly computer shop to get the refill ink. You can save your money with this way.

Disapear the TaskBar

If taskbar is always disrupt while you do a task in your computer. You can hidden the taskbar by right click on the taskbar, go to properties then check the box Auto – Hide the Taskbar.. That’s all your taskbar will hide automatically.

Change the Taskbar Position

You also can change the taskbar position wherever you want it. Just click the taskbar without release it then move to the position that you want weather above, right or left on your monitor screen.

Get the Windows Explorer Program Quickly

Just Right Click on your mouse at the start button. Choose Explore and left click the “Explorer”.

DOUBLE CLICK, ONCE CLICK, LEFT CLICK AND RIGHT CLICK

You can get more secret with do a double click, once click, left click and right click on the certain item on your computer. This will not disrupt you computer system.

How tidy up appearance on the XP Start Menu

Today I want to share a ways to tidy up appearance on Start Menu in the Windows XP Operating System with removing the “recently-used programs” as listed below.

For your information, there are two ways to remove the ‘recently-used programs’ on the start menu:

1. You need to change to Classic Menu appearance. The way is right click on start menu, go to properties, choose on the Classic menu selection, and click ok.
2. The second way is right click on start menu and press the “customize” that biside with start menu button. Then you go to general tab that is on the top. After that you set “number of programs on the Start menu” to Value 0 and press OK. If you want to back to normal, you just need to set the value according your need.

This tutorial is using the second way. The result is like the pic below. Now the appearance of the Start menu on your computer will look tidy. Good try.

Basic Computer Tips - Part 7

Address Book In Traveling

If you always traveling, I suggesting you so that you export address book to text format. In this way, you can bring together address book information into USB pendrive do not to worry because you can read in all computers that has Notepad software. The way is easier.

Insert a USB pendrive into USB drive.

Open Address Book choose File>Go>Export>Address Book.

When Export Dialog Box is Open, choose Textfile (Comma Separated Values).
Click on Export and enter file name. For example H:/Address.txt

Then click next and choose item that you want to export. After you make a choice, click finish. Return to dialog box, click “Close” to save the changes that you has been done and close dialog box.

Create Your Own TOOLBAR on TaskBar

You can change any folder to Toolbar. Just click once, the folder will run. To create your own toolbar:

1. Right Click on any blank space on taskbar
2. Click on Toolbars and choose New Toolbar.
3. Click on the folder that you want to made a toolbar and click OK.
4. After you’ve done create toolbar, you can click and release to any location on your desktop.

Select a Specific Text in Microsoft Word.

If you need to select more texts besides which is you needed, you can try following way.

Click on the beginning of the text that is to be select. Press F8 button, then use arrow key to select the desirability text. When it done, press ESC button to ended the selection.

To select the whole page, you just need click on the top of the page (or any part do you want) press F8, and then press CTRL+G.

When “Find And Replace” windows box appear, choose “page” and click “next”. After that, you select the page. Click Esc to close dialog box and then click Esc again to end the selection.

VIPRE Antivirus and Antispyware

VIPRE Antivirus and Antispyware

Although Sunbelt Software is not a new company, they do have a new Anti Virus and Anti SpyWare Product that is garnering some great accolades from top media sources.

They have recently announced a free 15 day trial of their VIPRE Antivirus Software and Antispyware product. The free trial can be downloaded here.

The software uses less resources (memory and cpu) than almost other similar products which ultimately makes your pc run faster.

Most of the larger media sources have given it great reviews, including download.com, ZDNet, and PC Magazine.

Downloading the trial requires is simple and only requires an email address. After which you will receive a unique install key.

How to Make a Table of Contents in Microsoft Word

We are always follow many tips just in writing, but I got one video for you for good practise in Microsoft Word... Here it's come....

Hide the Computer Drive

Because of certain excuse, sometime we are probably to hide our Computer Drive (C,D,E….) in computer.

Here are two alternatives that can be done to hide or remove the drive from our windows display without going through the registry editor and without using additional software.

The first way is to use diskpart command, and the latter by using gpedit (group policy editor), which must be both easy to do

The first way is by using the diskpart command.

1. Click Start -> Run -> type cmd -> click OK

2. Type diskpart -> press enter

3. Type list volume -> press enter (to see the list of drives in the computer)

Specify which Drive will be hidden, for example here we will hide drives D.

4. Type select volume 3 -> press Enter

5. Type remove letter D -> press Enter

type exit to quit diskpart.

(To see the results check on my computer, in some cases the computer must be restarted first).

To Restore or show the hidden drive back, do the same from step 1 to 4

In step 5 orders changed to:

Type assign letter D

The second way is by using the command gpedit (group policy editor)

1. Click Start -> Run -> type gpedit.msc -> click OK

2. Double-click User Configuration -> Administrative Templates -> Windows Components -> Windows Explorer -> then select the Hide these specified drives in my computer in the right window.

In the Hide specified drives in My Computer Window: select enable, then specify the drive that will be hidden (restrict)

For example here that will be hidden is drive D, then select restrict D drive only, then click Apply -> OK

Check in My Computer to see the results.

To show again, do the same sequence of steps, then the Hide specified drives in My Computer windows, select Not Configured option -> click Apply -> OK

Good luck hopefully useful.

From Computer Blog - Tips And Guide