Station User Manual
Scan and transfer files
This chapter contains a step-by-step guide for scanning mobile media, e.g. a USB drive, to examine if there is malicious content on it, like computer viruses, trojan horses or other malware. If no malware is found, it transfers the content to a second USB drive.
Before you start, you will see a generic screen welcoming you to insert your media into the Impex station. At this point in time, it is also possible to change the language that is used for all dialogues. Impex is available in most major languages.
1. Insert the source media (usb drive) into the left port
2. Insert the destination media or target drive in the right port
The screen should now display both of the drives, their brand and model name. Press the “View Content” button to look at the actual files on the drive.
3. Press on the left arrow to transfer the files to the right side drive
Please note that the right side drive will be erased and cleaned (formatted) to make sure it is empty. If the source drive is a CD or DVD the target drive filesystem will be exfat.
4. Depending on your local security policy you might have to enter your identification using the on-screen keyboard and press a confirm button to continue
This is a pop-up screen on which you need to fill in your email address. If the Impex has been configured to, there might also be a list of preloaded names to choose from, making it easier, and faster, for users to use the identification screen.
The confirmation screen will display some information describing the process used by, and the action taken by, Impex. It asks you to read and acknowledge this information before proceeding.
The files on your source USB drive will now be analysed for virus, malware and other unwanted software. During this process a progress bar will be shown depicting a rough estimate on how much time is left.
If nothing malicious was detected you will see a green screen together with a receipt which gives an overview of which files were scanned and their unique checksums. If a printer is attached and enabled you will also get a printout of a summary.
In the case that unwanted files were detected the screen will go red and a listing will show which file or files contained malware. Note that in this case no files will be transferred so the target USB drive will still be clean. If a printer is attached and enabled you will also get a printout. To view only the malicious files, press “Filter”. The source drive containing the malicious files will not be modified or cleaned by the system.
Your local security policy should dictate what to do with the source USB drive in case malware is found.
5. To complete the scanning press “Done” and pull out the USB drives
If at any point you want to abort the procedure, pull the USB drives. It is also worth mentioning that the station does not require you to copy from left to right. The process can also be done in the other direction. That means you can also transfer files from right to left. The files will be analysed and scanned before being copied, no matter in what direction they are copied to. This can in certain situations be more intuitive depending on the physical placement of the IMPEX station.
Format a USB drive
If the “Allow format only” option has been enabled in the IMPEX Control Center one can also use the IMPEX station for formatting a USB drive. If the option is turned on the “Format device” button appears when just one drive is inserted. It does not matter in which port the drive is inserted.
1. Insert a USB Drive
2. Press the “Format Device” button
3. Read the text and then press “Confirm”
This screen will display text describing the actions you are about to take. If you click on “confirm”, the next step will be to format the attached USB drive. If you have changed your mind, or performed this action in error, just remove the attached USB device to interrupt the formatting.
The progress bar is a measure that will display the progress of the actual formatting
After acknowledging that the user understands that the USB drive will be erased and all information on it will be lost the drive will be formatted and a new FAT32 filesystem created on it. If the drive is larger than 2TB it will be partitioned with GPT and the filesystem will be exfat.
After the process is complete the final view will contain a receipt showing information about the drive.
The receipt is shown on the screen. The receipt will contain important information, including:
- brand and model of the attached usb devices
- name of the attached usb devices
- file system used when formatting
- serial numbers of the attached devices
4. Press “Done” and remove the USB drive
The USB drive is now formatted and clean, ready for use.
Scan one USB drive
If the “Allow scan only” option has been enabled in the IMPEX Control Center one can also use the IMPEX station for scanning a USB drive without transferring any files. If enabled, a “Scan Device” button appears when only one drive is inserted. It does not matter in which port the drive is inserted.
1. Insert a USB Drive
2. Press the “Scan Device” button
Depending on your local security policy you might have to enter your identification using the on-screen keyboard and press a confirm button to continue.
This is a pop-up screen on which you need to fill in your email address. If the Impex have been configured to, there might also be a list of preloaded names to choose from. making it easier, and faster, for users to use the identification screen.
The confirmation screen will display some information describing the process used by, and the action taken by, Impex. It asks you to read and acknowledge this information before proceeding.
The files on the USB drive will now be analysed for virus, malware and other unwanted software. During this process a progress bar will be shown depicting a rough estimate on how much time is left.
If nothing malicious was detected you will see a green screen together with a receipt which gives an overview of which files were scanned and their unique checksums. If a printer is attached and enabled you will also get a printout of this summary.
In the case that unwanted files were detected the screen will go red and a listing will show which file or files contained malware. If a printer is attached and enabled you will also get a printout. To only view the malicious files, press “Filter”. The drive containing the malicious files will not be modified or cleaned by the system.
Your local security policy should dictate what to do with the USB drive in case malware is found.
3. To complete the procedure press “Done” and pull out the USB drive
If at any point you want to abort the procedure before this, pull the USB drive.
Shred a USB drive
If the “Allow shred only” option has been enabled in the IMPEX Control Center one can also use the IMPEX station for shredding a USB drive. If the option is turned on the “Shred device” button appears when just one drive is inserted. It does not matter in which port the drive is inserted.
1. Insert a USB Drive
2. Press the “Shred Device” button
3. Read the text and then press “Confirm”
This screen will display text describing the actions you are about to take. If you click on “confirm”, the next step will be to shred and format the attached USB drive. If you have changed your mind, or performed this action in error, just remove the attached USB device to interrupt the shredding and formatting.
The progress bar is a measure that will display the progress of the actual shredding.
After acknowledging that the user understands that the USB drive will be shredded and all information on it will be lost the drive will be formatted and a new FAT32 filesystem created on it. If the drive is larger than 2TB it will be partitioned with GPT and the filesystem will be exfat.
After the process is complete the final view will contain a receipt showing information about the drive. It will also contain information on how many passes of shredding occured. The system automatically shreds in three passes if the drive is detected to be a magnetic spin disk. If it is a flash drive, only one pass is done to preserve write cycles on the hardware. Since there is no problem with magnetic residues on a flash drive, one pass is considered enough.
The receipt is shown on the screen. The receipt will contain important information, including:
- brand and model of the attached usb devices
- name of the attached usb devices
- file system used when formatting
- serial numbers of the attached devices
- how many shredding passes was performed
4. Press “Done” and remove the USB drive
The USB drive is now formatted and clean, ready for use.
5. Shredding disclaimer on SSDs
Due to how flash drives work, there is no guarantee that each sector gets shredded. The firmware in the drive might direct writes to different sectors even though the same block is written to. This is called wear leveling and is a method to increase a SSDs life span.
6. Bitlocker exception
Bitlocker drives cannot be shredded at the moment because IMPEX cannot re-create the bitlocker container. If a device has a bitlocker container on it, the shred-button will not be shown. We recommend changing the bitlocker password to something very long which is practically the same as shredding it. This might change in an upcoming version.
Change language
The IMPEX station interface has support for several languages. To switch language press on the Flag symbol up in the right corner and choose your desired language in the popup.
This is the screen with a language symbol in the top right corner. By clicking on the touch screen, you will be able to change language settings in the Impex station.
When you have clicked on the flag symbol, a menu will appear. This menu will display the different languages that you can select to set the Impex station user interface language.
This is what the interface looks like after changing the language setting to Swedish.
System Information Page
The System Information page contains information about the configuration and health of the IMPEX station.
On the initial screen down in the right corner is the link to the information page. This link will be green in case the Anti Virus signatures and Operating System are up to date and red in case they are out of date.
The information page has four sections. The “STATION” section contains information about the version of the IMPEX software, the local station’s identification and its hostname. It also contains the last time AV and OS updates were fetched.
The “CONFIGURATION” and “ANTIVIRUS ENGINES” section show settings set in the Impex Control Center for this station. These settings can only be changed on the server side.
The “NETWORK STATUS” section shows the network address configuration and which IMPEX Control Center the station is connected to.
This page is primarly meant for the technical staff on site but might be useful for others as well.
Scan and transfer files from one USB drive to another (only text instruction)
This step-by-step guide is for scanning a USB drive for virus and malware and if none are found, transfer them to a second USB drive.
1. Insert the source drive into the left port
2. Insert the destination or target drive in the right port
The screen should now display both of the drives, their brand and model name. Press the “View Content” button to look at the actual files on the drive.
3. Press on the left arrow to transfer the files to the right side drive
Please note that the right side drive will be erased and cleaned (formatted) to make sure it is empty. If the source drive is a CD or DVD the target drive filesystem will be exfat.
4. Depending on your local security policy you might have to enter your identification using the on-screen keyboard and press a confirm button to continue
The files on your source USB drive will now be analysed for virus, malware and other unwanted software. During this process a progress bar will be shown depicting a rough estimate on how much time is left.
If nothing malicious was detected you will see a green screen together with a receipt which gives an overview of which files were scanned and their unique checksums. If a printer is attached and enabled you will also get a printout of this summary.
In the case that unwanted files were detected the screen will go red and a listing will show which file or files contained malware. Note that in this case no files will be transferred so the target USB drive will still be clean. If a printer is attached and enabled you will also get a printout. To view only the malicious files, press “Filter”. The source drive containing the malicious files will not be modified or cleaned by the system.
Your local security policy should dictate what to do with the source USB drive in case malware is found.
5. To complete the scanning press “Done” and pull out the USB drives
If at any point you want to abort the procedure, pull the USB drives. It is also worth mentioning that the station does not require you to copy from left to right. The process can also be done in the other direction. That means you can also transfer files from right to left. The files will be analysed and scanned before being copied, no matter in what direction they are copied to. This can in certain situations be more intuitive depending on the physical placement of the IMPEX station.