Patent ID: 6934852

Claim:
A method for providing access protection to electronic storage devices, said method comprising the steps of providing a device-stored hardware-level security code for a storage device on which is stored an electronic file to which user access is restricted; initializing said security code within said storage device during set-up of said storage device, wherein said security code is unique to said storage device and is required to complete all accesses to said storage device, including read accesses and write accesses, wherein said initializing includes: blocking access to said storage device during said initializing; and placing said security code within pre-determined bits of a microcode of the storage device, wherein said predetermined bits are defaulted to a default value when no security code is placed therein; providing within an operating system (OS) of a user computer an OS-extension that enables (1) retrieval of said security code from said storage device to said user computer system and (2) blocking access to said storage device by processes on said user computer system when a user-provided code does not match the security code retrieved from the storage device; wherein the OS-extension enables use of the hardware-level security code within a localized, OS-level security checking process, wherein said hardware-level security code is loaded into the OS-level security checking process whenever a user process on the user computer system attempts a read or write operation on said storage device; and allowing access by said user process to said storage device from the user-computer system with the OS-extension only when the user-provided code is determined by the localized, OS-level security checking process to match said hardware-level security code.