Restricting USB port use to specific devices

I've been looking for a way to restrict the use of USB ports for our remote users. They do have devices that need port use - printers,bluetooth adapter, and one has a wireless adapter. I do not want to turn the ports off completely, just limit them to these type of devices. Anyone find a way to do this? We do not want them to be able to plug in flash drives, etc for security reasons.

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Comments

Plantwiz

just spitballing....

I'm wondering if you can limit it with virtural USB devices? IF you were able to create a virtual USB port for the print device, perhaps it could be isolated??

I need to go look into that, but just thinking....

Claymoore

You can use Group Policy in the newer OSes to restrict hardware by device type or class. Moskowitz discusses this in detail in his Creating the Secure Managed Desktop book, but here is a link to a Technet magazine article he wrote:

Security: Managing Hardware Restrictions via Group Policy

laidbackfreak

you could look at usb serial numbers and only allowing those you specify.

tiersten

laidbackfreak wrote: »

you could look at usb serial numbers and only allowing those you specify.

Not many devices actually implement the serial numbers. You can easily test it out by unplugging something and then plugging it into a different port. If it starts the new hardware detected procedure then it doesn't implement that part of the USB spec.

dynamik

Desktop Authority - ScriptLogic

mrmcmint

Device Control | USB Security and Port Protection | Data Encryption | Lumension

This works well too.