USB sticks get fingerprinted

A new memory stick on sale next week turns fingerprints into passwords. Lexar Media's JumpDrive TouchGuard uses a sensor that reads the miniscule ridges on a finger, and unlocks the encrypted data on the USB memory stick if there's a match.

"It's going to be in Best Buy [one of the largest chains of US consumer electronics shops] stores starting Monday," Christopher Crump, a project manager at Cogent Systems, said Thursday. Cogent wrote the software. Fujitsu makes the finger-scanning chip for the TouchGuard stick, which was demonstrated at a technology conference this week. Sony already sells a similar product called Micro Vault.