I am looking for a fast USB drive which has a physical write-protect enable switch on it. I would also want a BadUSB-resistant USB controller. I want this for 2 reasons:

• So I can diagnose issues on machines where the problem may or may not be malware. This way, I can plug it into several machines without risking spreading malware.

• So I can carry around a TailsOS drive wherever I go, and use it on public computers and friend’s computers without risk of infection.

So far, I have only found one company making these things, Kanguru. There are almost no reviews of their products by reputable sources, at least not for their write-protecting drives.

Their BadUSB firmware detection module is NIST certified, which is great (given that you trust proprietary cryptography modules at all), but no certs for the main storage write protection. Also Kanguru products are very overpriced.

And no I am not using SD cards, their write protect implementation is software-based and they are too slow for me.

I am specifically looking at the Kanguru FlashTrust . My questions are:

• Has anyone used Kanguru products and how was your experience?

• Are there other companies that make decent quality drives with hardware write-protect switches? (Ideally ones that have FOSS firmware and are third-party tested, but I will take anything).

• Are there any companies that make USB writeblockers which are small enough to fit in a wallet and <$50? (Example of one that is too big). That way I can use a standard, cheaper USB drive.

Oh how I wish Nitrokey made these!