Self-destructive technology
Our protagonist stands in a dark office, hunched over a desk, face lit by a computer monitor. “Come on. Come on.” We see a file copy progress indicator zipping through filenames. 88%. 89%. We see a handful of armed men in black tactical gear quickly ascending a staircase. The protagonist’s hand hovers over the portable drive connector ready to snap it away. Presumably the seconds it would take to get out of an executive chair could prove critical. 94%.
The armed men have reached their floor, they begin to move down the corridor. Sweat is visible on the protagonist’s forehead. 97%. The armed men are positioned outside the door. Our protagonist looks up, as if aware of imminent danger.
The armed men break down the door and file into a similar, but noticeably lit, office. Room secure, our protagonist not found. A mean-looking man in a suit brushes past and rounds the desk to the monitor on the desktop. “Damn!” We see the screen “Data copied to remote terminal: 100%. Wiping local drive, pass 2: 20%…” before the suited man grasps the computer’s power cord and yanks it out.
“Span out. Check all offices with level 3 access. They may still be here.” We see our protagonist briskly walking down a corridor, placing a portable drive in their pocket, and leaving through a fire exit.
I love seeing, essentially quotidian, technology in dramatic situations – no matter how hackneyed. Especially running backups, which is inescapably tedious. If I’m not being paid to run backups, I’m just not motivated.
Something like The Tao of Backup is cute, but there’s no frisson. It’s usually a dramatic portrayal of data loss that prompts me into action for personal backups. Action usually being: add a reminder to back-up such-and-such to my personal To-do list or, if it’s (inevitably) already there, increase that task priority level… or something. Yawn.
And if we can’t get backups right, what chance do we have with data erasure, its data security twin sister?
Movies are already there, of course. When the secret base is compromised in movies (such as Mr and Mrs Smith and Blade: Trinity) the evacuation procedure involves activating remote data uploads and securely sanitising the local stores.
Sometimes it’s incorporated into the plan, with each stage trading power for mobility. Desktops and servers synced to laptops and abandoned, laptops synced to smartphones. Finessing the computing bulk like segments of an Apollo launch vehicle, cast off sections burning up on the atmosphere.
I sometimes lament that this data evacuation procedure doesn’t really exist for consumer level tech in the real world. Some simple procedure where personal data gets backed up, cleared out, and the device is reset to its virgin state suitable for sending off for repairs, loaning, selling, or even just crossing US borders. A sort of infotech hymenorrhaphy.
I guess the “copy everything and wipe” is the already the standard mode of operation for something like a digital camera. My iPod Touch actually has a self-destruct feature: fail to guess the access code after several tries and its internal storage is wiped. Reassurance that the impact of losing a device has an easily calculable monetary cost rather than the additional unease and uncertainty that comes with loss of personal data, access credentials, etc.
It’s odd that laptops don’t seem to have the same feature as standard. I guess it works on the iPod/iPhone as it’s not that much data, and any notes, calendar events, etc will get synced to my laptop usually within 24 hours. I wouldn’t lose more than I’ll be able to recall. (And I assume having network access and a MobileMe account would allow it to be synced more frequently than that).
So why not, as standard, a self-destruct sequence for a personal computer?
These invisible tendrils of self, of identity, attach themselves around our phones, computers, PVRs, iPods, video games. Our own data transforming into the vulnerable tamagotchi of self. A lost cell-phone contact list, a social-life crisis. A broken Animal Crossing cartridge, the loss of investment in an entire village.
It used to be easier, I’m sure. An older games console such as the PS2 could only store it’s configuration detail on small removable, flash memory cartridges. On games consoles such as the Wii the memory is inside the device. You could sit down and manually copy off just the personal savegame files on to a USB drive or an SD card, I guess. In the case of the Xbox 360, at least, the harddrive is an easily removable, replaceable, part.
The current model of personal computer backup is that of full system restoration, not of personal data. Even if you’ve never created a single document, installation of an operating system and office packages, and a couple of years worth of upgrades and downloaded updates still represents a large number of gigabytes of backup commitment.
Which means my backups get sent to a relatively bulky USB drive rather than, say, a 16GB microSD the size of my fingernail. Something that would be more than enough to backup the variable/irreplaceable stuff that lives on my laptop and be easily carried in my wallet. Or have surgically implanted in my arse.
Which is not to say that backing up full systems isn’t also useful. At least Time Machine exists and is actively bugging people to plug in their backup drives or whatever. It might be more impressive if, on a sufficiently recently backed up machine, there was also an option to set the conditions to securely wipe the original. (OS X doesn’t seem to make it easy to nuke the root device of a running system – I assume you need to first boot from an installation disc.)
I guess I’d just like to be able to “de-personalise” a personal computer. I’d like to transform this sense of ownership into a sense of custodianship. I don’t want it to always be “My Computer”. Wipe out my personal information and leave the tools, the programs, installed in place for someone else. (Like putting /home/ and /var/, on traditional Unix’y systems, on separate partitions that can be securely wiped.)
And then, when I’m in control of my information on the devices I own, I can start worrying about the the information out on the net, on devices I’ve never even seen, for now just assuming that it’s all safe in the hands of professionals.
