IronKey EMS

What do you like best?

It's a very secure application and setup to work with Ironkeys and Datalocker products. Our deployment is an extremely minimal/locked down version of CentOS hosted in ESXi. The setup and configuration of the EMS is almost completely done through the CLI and provides fairly robust security in terms of communication with devices and components.

What do you dislike?

Certificate importing is an absolute pain, so it is vital that you use 3 year certificates if possible so you don't have to suffer once a year. I'm being a bit dramatic, but it is very time consuming and annoying especially as trusted CAs change between versions.

Some of the setup requirements are so stringent that you can end up with Ironkey devices that can't be used anymore. For example, the setup key that is used to set up an instance is bound to that license and instance. I've burned a key a before by not handling the setup perfectly, so it can no longer be used as it is bound to an installation that no longer exists. Plan your upgrades carefully.

Recommendations to others considering the product:

If a cloud based version is available to your company, I'd go that direction over the hassle of managing the on prem.

What problems are you solving with the product? What benefits have you realized?

Allows us to securely store data that is used for mobile and DR purposes. If an Ironkey is stolen, it is fully encrypted and locked down via the policies provided by the EMS.