Phison and Cigent talk about “self-defending” SSDs

Phison Electronics, a global leader in flash drive controllers, and Cigent Technology, an embedded cybersecurity company, have unveiled details of a joint development that, they say, “sets a new standard for cybersecurity.” It is said to be the first and so far the only line of “self-defending” drives with built-in firmware protection against ransomware, data theft, and intrusions from insider intruders.

“Software security is often easy to circumvent, but our patented multi-tier self-protecting storage is capable of making critical data completely inaccessible and literally invisible to attackers, giving customers the confidence that their sensitive data and digital assets are protected,” – this is how the head of Cigent described the development.

These are Cigent drives, which were originally developed for use by the US government and the military. They are now the world’s first commercially available solid state drives of this kind. The K2 and Denali drives integrate proprietary firmware-based cybersecurity features into the Phison PCIe NVMe controller firmware. This integration with firmware provides active protection as close to the data as possible – inside the storage device, below the layers of not only application software, but even the operating system and BIOS. Cigent Secure SSDs detect and repel ransomware attacks, automatically encrypt and hide sensitive files when a threat is detected, and create zones in the drive’s memory that are completely invisible to any attacker.

An additional layer of protection is provided by the Cigent D³E software agent for Windows. It adds the Zero Trust seamless multi-factor authentication layer to any file.

Cigent K2 drives and D³E software are now available. The Cigent Denali SSD with additional data protection based on machine learning will be available in summer 2021. These drives can serve as primary storage in a Windows PC, secondary internal storage, or external storage connected via USB.