Encrypting a FileSystem

[DeeVeeDee]

Does anyone know if there is a way to encrypt a harddrive so that when you install Windows its installed on top of the encryption.

Like an encryption layer in between the HDD and the FS ?

So if you had to lose your laptop, the drive cant be put into a External HDD casing or PC to be read ?

[rustypup]

bad idea...

you can encrypt volumes and folders, but encryption carries a significant performance and space impact - which is why no sane person would run their OS inside an encrypted FS...

windows' folder/volume encryption is laughably easy to crack...

if you're looking to protect business critical info, you could use tools like truecrypt or PGP to mount and manage encrypted files/volumes using something a little more secure than NTFS defaults...

PGP offers a pay-for version and is now under the symantec umbrella

if you're looking to brick the machine if it's "procured" by some nefarious party, some plastique on a timer's the thing....

[doo_much]

Since I don't have a ready supply of plastique (except if you could help me out with a few ounces?) Truecrypt looks like something I could do with.

Question as always is what does PGP have that Truecrypt doesn't?

[rustypup]

paid for support... it's a business risk thing..

neither truecrypt nor PGP offers 100% guarantee that data will be unrecoverable... there's a number of professional tools out there that slice through them like a sledgehammer... but they will certainly inconvenience someone looking to conduct a little industrial espionage...

[doo_much]

Do they guarantee 100% that the data will be recoverable though?

I'm more interested in leaving tools as well as source and driver files on clients' PCs that are only accessible to myself. It'll save me a lot of hassles since one of them doesn't allow us contractors to use memory sticks on their machines.

[DeeVeeDee]

bad idea...

you can encrypt volumes and folders, but encryption carries a significant performance and space impact - which is why no sane person would run their OS inside an encrypted FS...

windows' folder/volume encryption is laughably easy to crack...

if you're looking to protect business critical info, you could use tools like truecrypt or PGP to mount and manage encrypted files/volumes using something a little more secure than NTFS defaults...

PGP offers a pay-for version and is now under the symantec umbrella

if you're looking to brick the machine if it's "procured" by some nefarious party, some plastique on a timer's the thing....

I'm supposed to be using HP but i use Lenovo S10's, and HP.
If i'm not mistaking,HP Pcs can encrypt data by hardware before it lands onto the harddrive.

But i suppose even that will affect the performance.
So i will probably have to educate people to encrypt sensitive info by means of some utility.

[Hman]

What I understand from the op is that he does not want to encrypt the FS he wants to encrypt the drive itself, so that a criminal can't format the drive and use it again.

That is unfortunately impossible to do, but there are systems which locks a drive so a criminal can't use it. Can't remember any info on it though

[rustypup]

wait a bit... have you verified the drives support FDE?.... there's a slim number of choices out there and the system, at least what i saw demo'd, had a number of glaring flaws...

that was a year or 2 back..... maybe they've progressed somewhat...

[DeeVeeDee]

What I understand from the op is that he does not want to encrypt the FS he wants to encrypt the drive itself, so that a criminal can't format the drive and use it again.

That is unfortunately impossible to do, but there are systems which locks a drive so a criminal can't use it. Can't remember any info on it though

No who ever steals the laptop can format the drive and do what ever with it, I just dont want them to gain the info on it, cus a HDD is just a HDD no matter whats on it it will be formatable.
(Unless the HDD PCB has some kind of protection on it)

I searched the forum before i posted,DAE_JA_VOO on this forum had some drive whch could do this "IRON Drive" or something in the line of that.
But its not what i want,
(Edit why is my text drawing boobies )


Ive never worked with trueCrypt
What i understand from it is, it creates a virtual encrypted HDD then present it to the OS as normal HDD space.
When ever the OS passes data to the drive truecrypt is in the middle and encrypts the data before actually saving it on the drive.
But like Rustypup said this will have an effect on the drive speed, and probably eat CPU power.
Most USB File vaults work like this, its simply a encrypted zip file which mounts as a drive. (Like ubuntu and Mac does by default with ISO's or DMG's)

I'm also not sure if you can install a bootable OS on this encrypted Virtual drive ?
If so i can only imagine the OS has to run inside a VM ? (Bit confused) Cus the OS will want to communicate directly with the hardware instead of truecrypt's Virtual hardware ?

[doo_much]

But ( . Y . ) not what i want,
(Edit why is my text drawing boobies )

We have a saying in Afrikaans:

"Wat die hart van vol is loop die mond van oor"

[DeeVeeDee]

But ( . Y . ) not what i want,
(Edit why is my text drawing boobies )

We have a saying in Afrikaans:

"Wat die hart van vol is loop die mond van oor"

LOL!!!!! its cus there was a 'T' infron of its.

[Hman]

Best solution is to partition the drive into two partitions, run windows on one partition unencrypted and everything else on a encrypted partition. How you encrypt the one partition is up to you. Set everything in windows to point to the encrypted volume, including document and temp folders.

You could also run your pagefile in the encrypted volume but this will slow down the pc quite considerably if you don't have lots of ram.

[rustypup]

You could also run your pagefile in the encrypted volume

<carefully ticks the "raving psychotic" box in Hman's profile..> it's a laptop.. .never mind the speed, i think the disc thrashing will trash it fairly quickly, whilst halving the battery life...

[Hman]

/You keep profiles of your intended victims? /

If the PF is really small and he has 4GB worth of ram it won't be that bad.

[A_BULLET]

If cant use USBs maybe he can use CDs!

[Slimshaedy]

Won't Bitlocker work?
PS I've never used it and last time I tried encrypting a folder I was still able to view the contents on a friends computer
So I'm just suggesting something:)

[-Prometheus-]

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