The USB has the ability to heat the chip up to 100°C to self-destruct when hacked

Ryan Walker of Interrupt Labs has developed a USB that can self-heat its flash chip up to 100 degrees Celsius to destroy the data inside every time it is hacked.

This device capable of 'suicide' like in the Mission Impossible movies is called Ovrdrive and is crowdfunding on Crowd Supply.

Ovrdrive also has a smart security feature that hides data unless you plug it in properly. Specifically, when you plug in the drive normally and the partition will be hidden, making it appear corrupted, but the data will appear normally when plugged in three times in a row.

Initially, Ryan Walker wanted to develop a USB that could self-destruct, but then he realized this was difficult to replicate when producing USBs in large quantities. However, the final product is still equipped with a self-destruct circuit so it can still be used if desired.

The circuit of this USB can heat up to 100 degrees Celsius thanks to the ability to reverse the power supply to the flash chip. Although this temperature is not enough to destroy the chip, it can act as a catalyst to make the person intending to steal this USB give up.

 This feature is disabled by default so that users do not accidentally enable it.

Ovrdrive is expected to launch in August 2024 and will be priced at $69 with free shipping (or $12 for international shipping). Ryan Walker's goal was to raise $3,500 and has now reached $2,922.

Marvin Fry

Update 18 February 2024