Ubuntu – How to disable usb storage

In Linux the risk of viruses are small to nonexistent, however USB sticks automatically mount for reading and writing regardless. There's an easy way in recent Ubuntu distributions to disable USB storage devices. Simply blacklist the kernel driver:

echo "blacklist usb-storage" | sudo tee -a /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf

Then update the initramfs

sudo update-initramfs -u

After that, nobody can use a USB memory stick in that computer, but still allows the administrator(s) to manually load the module and use it.

source is here: http://www.ossramblings.com/disabling_usb_storage_in_linux

Another way which is more selective is to note that users who are members of the plugdev group are allowed to access pluggable storage devices so you could just remove any users you don't want to use USB sticks from that group.

source: here