Disable USB port for mass storage

[Werner Schram]

Hi Arun,

Arun Shrimali wrote:
> Can anybody help me how to disable usb ports for mass storages (pen
> /thumb drives) in Ubuntu 9.10
>
> Arun
>
> On Sat, Dec 5, 2009 at 4:41 PM, Arun Shrimali <arun.reso at gmail.com> wrote:
>   
>> Dear All,
>> I was using few PCs with Ubuntu 8.10, for the security reasons their
>> USB ports were disabled with the following method ;
>>
>> 1. Press Alt+F2 and enter:
>> polkit-gnome-authorization
>> 2. Go to Storage => Mount file systems from removable drivers
>> 3. Press the "Edit..." button
>> 4. Choose "Active Console: Authentication"
>> 5. Press the "Modify..." button
>>
>> Now with the upgrade to Ubuntu 9.10, above procedure is not working as
>> policy toolkit was not in default installation and even after
>> installing policykit-gnome, about method is not working as could not
>> find option for removable drives.
>>
>> Is there any way in 9.10, I can disable USB ports for mass storages ??
>>     
In system->administration->users and groups (after installing 
policykit-gnome), you can disable the 'access external storage devices 
automatically' option for specific users. I don't know how to do this 
for every user, or how to set this as the default policy. You could also 
blacklist the usb-storage module, but that method doesn't allow 
exceptions, which might be wanted.

Regards,
Werner