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Data on the unit – which will be demonstrated at Infosecurity Europe from 28th – 30th April 2010 at Earls Court, London (Stand D50) - is secured by a 6-18 digit PIN number that is entered directly on the device itself.

According to Andy Cordial, Origin Storage’s managing director, he expects the 1TB device, which can easily store two or more hard drive images from a typical desktop or a laptop PC, to be used in a variety of situations, as organisations grapple with the fact that penalties for breaches of the Data Protection Act will soar a hundred-fold - from £5,000 to £500,000 – with effect from the 6th of April this year.

“The Information Commissioner’s Office has already indicated that it will penalise those organisations that experience a data leak, loss or theft which could reasonably have been prevented,” he said.

“And financial penalties aside, there is the credibility issue that arises when a company has been pilloried in the media for failing to protect its staff or customer data. This can have a serious effect on a firm’s share price and longer-term reputation,” he added.

It’s against this backdrop that Cordial says he expects the 1TB Data Locker to appeal to a broad spectrum of users, ranging from laptop users wanting to secure their data for home working or whilst on the move, to IT departments looking for a means of quickly backing up data via the supplied USB cable, then securing the drive using its PIN/password protection system.

And, Cordial explained, because the Data Locker is so portable, it’s increasingly being used by organisations wanting to back up their data in a highly secure manner, and placing the unit in a physically secure environment, such as a fire-proof safe.

At the competitive price point of £399 plus VAT it is offered at, he says, companies can back up their data in a highly secure manner and help avoid their business experience a potentially expensive visit from an ICO inspection team, for which the ICO has reportedly been recruiting extra staff for in the last few months.

On the specifications front, the Data Locker uses a hardware based encryption chip to seamlessly encrypt and decrypt data using military grade AES / CBC mode encryption, with the unit only allowing its hidden SATA drive – connected via USB cable – to mount when the correct PIN is entered via the LCD keypad.

You can also use the LCD screen to change the Data Locker PIN, dismount the drive, toggle the encryption on or off, or wipe the drive clean.

Two different levels of security are available:

Data Locker Pro AES: Corporate and Local Government

Data Locker Enterprise: Military and transportation of mission critical data

The Data Locker offers state of the art features which include:

· Brute Force Attack Detect / Self Destruct Response

· One touch drive erase for rapid re-deployment using admin password

· Hardware Based Malware Detection / Deflection

· Unattended Auto Lock Function

· 100% Platform Independent Security and Authentication

· Hardware Based AES Encryption (CBC mode)

· No Software or pop-up password entry screens