Datalight Releases File Level Secure Delete

Datalight, Inc. released a new version of its Reliance Nitro File System, a product offering software support for file level secure delete, utilizing features defined by the e•MMC (Embedded MultiMediaCard) 4.40 and 4.41 specifications.

The secure delete feature in Reliance Nitro purges all the file data, including any hidden copies created by the file system to safe-guard reliability, when a file is copied or altered by the file system to ensure a completely secure erase. Assuming the complimentary hardware support, users can be confident that every instance or fragment of a file will be permanently deleted and therefore unrecoverable.

A recent study by the University of California, San Diego Non-Volatile System Laboratory highlights the challenges of effective deletion of secure data. UCSD researchers found that measures employed in SSDs and other flash arrays "produce copies of the data that are invisible to the user but that a sophisticated attacker can recover." Their analysis concludes that "sanitizing storage media to reliably destroy data is an essential aspect of overall data security."

"Over the years, many of our customers have asked for secure delete capability," said Roy Sherrill, Datalight CEO. "The UCSD study illustrates just how vulnerable users of flash memory are to data security breaches, and highlights the urgency for the implementation of secure delete in the industry. The secure operations features of e•MMC give us the hardware foundation we’ve been waiting for to deliver a robust solution."

The e•MMC 4.41 secure operations comprise two features: secure erase and secure trim. With the latest release of Reliance Nitro, users will be able to flag critical files as ‘secure’. Internally, the Datalight file system will then utilize these secure operations to permanently erase fragments and backups of those files.

"Data security is of increasing importance to our members, which is why we introduced secure delete for e•MMC 4.4 and higher," said John Kelly, president of JEDEC. "We are very pleased that Datalight will be providing software support for this important feature."

Support for secure delete is one part of the company’s initiative to provide software support for JESD84-B45, Embedded Multi-media Card (e•MMC), Electrical Standard (4.5 Device), recently published by JEDEC. The new JEDEC e•MMC (4.5) standard makes it easy to embed mass-storage flash memory on host systems. The standardized e•MMC protocol is for today’s smart phones and tablets, and the interface offers designers performance and keeps technology complexity invisible to the host.

Flash memory conforming to embedded MMC versions 4.4 & 4.41 are available from major flash vendors and it is anticipated 4.5 chips will be sampling in early 2012. Datalight’s e•MMC-optimized software products for Android, Linux and other embedded operating systems are available through the company and its resellers worldwide.