Hitachi Japan has unveiled the new FLORA series of laptops with information security in mind. There are two new product lines: the Hitachi Flora 210W and the Flora 270W. A variety of configuration options are available across both lines. Hitachi's managed to shave some weight of these laptops as well. So, what you get is an extremely light-weight, capable, and secure solution.

The laptops have the standard hardware configuration. So, let's focus on the much touted security aspect. Apart from the fingerprint authentication system (which is available in many flavors and also runs on Windows XP Embedded), there's also a utility that disables attaching external media like thumb-drives etc. All ports in/out can be disabled. There's also the "Clear The Flora" hardware scrubbing software. Is that enough to prevent information espionage? I don't think so.

Hitachi plans to sell these notebooks from the 24th of this month. The fingerprint device, however, goes on sale only from the 31st. Quite a strange move. For more on the product specifications and the pricing visit the product website below.

Product website: Hitachi Flora Notebooks with Fingerprint Security (Japanese).