My problem is the converse of Mweni Chibwa's last week: I need to protect access to a USB memory stick containing confidential correspondence, without having to protect each file separately.
Alan Craw
The simplest solution is probably to buy a USB thumbdrive that includes password protection. There are lots of ways to protect existing files, but they often require you to reformat the USB drive, or they work with software on the hard drive, or they need admin level access to the PC, or they have other problems.
The open source Truecrypt usually figures in my answers about encryption. In this case, you can use it with TCExplorer, which has been written to overcome the requirement for administrative privileges. A simpler option may be Rohos Mini Drive software, which is also free. I haven't used it, but the specifications indicate it does exactly what you want: it creates a secured volume on a guest computer if you click the Rohos icon on the USB Flash drive and enter a password.
