It seems governments and employers are becoming concerned over the use of memory sticks. With many computers supporting USB connections on the front of computers people stealing data has become much easier. Instead of a CD walking out the front door now would be thieves are leaving with these miniature memory sticks in there pants pockets.
I can see a day where we will all have to walk through a powerful magnet when we leave work. [The Register]
Memoery sticks consist of Flash memory.
Powerful magnets will not erase Flash memory, but if we had to walk through a huge electrical field, we would have a problem with retaining Flash memory data. Many portable devices use flash memory. These devices include cell phones and PDAs.