CC4 - WD My Passport Software

[superaz300]

Hello Guys,

 

We have recently purchased some WD My Passport external hard drives for staff to use, which are encrypted. We have tried to get this working on CC4 but the software will not open for Staff running from the drive itself. Is there a way to deploy the WD drive software, and has anyone achieved running these on a CC4 network? Logging on as a System Administrator, the drive opens fine because the software launches and asks for the password, but as a Staff or student user it wont even open the software.

 

Any ideas? All ideas is greatly appreciated as always

 

Cheers

James

[foofighterjim]

If the drives are all the same type and use the same exe (name and version) then you should be able to create a file rule in the RMMC to allow it to run. This setting would apply to all users though, not just the teachers.

[Sylv3r]

Can you not just format the drive or are you specifically wanting encryption. @foofighterjim method will work if you need to continue them as encrypted.

[superaz300]

Hi Guys,

 

Thanks for the replies. Well, I thought of creating a software exception in the RMMC, but this is were I ran into a problem. The software on the external drives basically acts as a CD drive, which when you run the software it and enter the correct password it unlocks the drive, and then the HDD appears in Windows Explorer. Unfortunately these drives have to be data encrypted due to confidential material being stored on them. Now my problem is, when I enter an exception in the RMMC, I don't know what drive letter the hard drive's software CD drive will grab, it will be different every time. So what I tried to do was copy the software from the drive and package it up, but it knows when the software itself is running from the drives and not my package location.

 

Hope this makes sense.

Cheers

James

[foofighterjim]

There is a big difference between file rules and path rules. What you described is a path rule that will allow or deny files in a specified directory. A file rule will allow a particular exe to run no matter what the location provided the exe matches the name and version number.

 

To create a file rule go to RMMC> Software> Software Restriction Policies. At the top of the main window you have two radio buttons to select path or file rules, for this instance you want a new file rule. Create a new allow rule, connect one of the drives and browse to the exe and then test.

[johnat1121]

Hi James,

Ive used bit-locker before on a CC4 network to overcome installing all the software which came with the external hard drives brought from different manufactures over time, also possible to do some magic in group policy so you can decrypt them if they forget they're password which has been a lifesaver a few times