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let's say I have two laptops. One have nothing on it and I connect it to the internet and browse the internet promiscuously, the other laptop is encrypted and I never plug it into the internet.

The problem is that I need to lookup information on the internet computer and occasionally transfer snippets of code from one computer to the other.

Any ideas how best to solve this problem without frying my USB ports and transfer USB virus to the other computer?

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  • Open whatever you got and start typing down the hex. If you're transferring files anyway USB is probably your easiest option with the most isolation. Or you could burn CDs.
    – Seth
    Oct 10, 2017 at 12:49
  • The only completely safe practice is to print on one machine and type on the other: any transfer medium can carry a virus. If you want to know what can be done, even on air-gapped systems, I recommend that you watch the documentary film Zero Days.
    – AFH
    Oct 10, 2017 at 13:09
  • That said, a reasonably secure solution would be to use serial ports between the machines, as LapLink used to do, but write your own transport protocol, as any commercial product could be infected: you should transfer only text files and any batch files must be thoroughly scrutinised before running on the isolated system. This would remove the need to print and type, and because serial ports are passé these days there are few viruses out there which exploit their use in inter-machine communications. Of course, if compilers get infected, they could inject a virus into any code they compile...
    – AFH
    Oct 10, 2017 at 13:30
  • Loosely related, superuser.com/questions/1246085/…
    – DankyNanky
    Oct 10, 2017 at 14:52
  • Host files to mitigate advertisement, utilization of the Tor Browser (restricts content loading), restricted application to network access via the use of a Firewall, and potentially restricted lists inside your browser (which can be accomplished via the Host file as well) would be the first obvious things.
    – DankyNanky
    Oct 10, 2017 at 14:54

3 Answers 3

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You could possibly use a firewall to block every other port other than ftp. You could then use a program like filezilla to transfer the files. Turn on your wifi or plug in your ethernet cable only when you need to transfer the files.

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Depending on how frequently you're talking about with the "occasionally" transferring, and how large the "snippets" are, I would consider:

  1. copy-typing. By far the most secure, since you literally have to process anything that is transferred, yourself, through your brain. Reasonable for small and/or infrequent transfers.
  2. print -> scan -> OCR. Feels awkward, but if copy-typing is simply too much, you can get more volume through this, even if you have to correct minor things in the OCR output. Better choice if it's large amounts, and less frequently, since the overhead is more substantial.
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  • QRCodes work well for this purpose.
    – David Schwartz
    Oct 10, 2017 at 22:19
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    @DavidSchwartz I agree, and in fact that's what I've done in the past. The size limitation is troublesome. But once you get the workflow down, it's more predictable than OCR.
    – Philipp Hanes
    Oct 19, 2017 at 20:09
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you might consider a version of print->scan->OCR by setting up dedicated monitor for print output, and dedicated camera with OCR for input. haven't tried this setup, but assume that once the devices are positioned then this setup eliminates the need for manually messing with the scanner.

as for QR codes, seems there's more throughput, potentially more than one page of data per scan. but i dont know if i trust the programs writing and receiving to not be infected to also transmit code i cant see.

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