Password Protecting Sensitive Data

[jasper1605]

Hey all,

I am in need of some methods of protecting some sensitive data on both an external harddrive and my own pc. Free programs would be appreciated, but if there are paid ones that work better and more reliably, then I am fine with that too. Any recommendations?

 

[Roph]

Truecrypt is the most obvious one. You can either encrypt an entire drive, or create a file on a drive that, when mounted (like you mount an .iso) appears as a removable drive.

 

[micropage7]

what about DiskCryptor

 

[newtekie1]

BitLocker, it is built right into Windows or 7-zip. I prefer 7-zip since it also compresses the data at the same time which saves space.

 

[jasper1605]

Thanks. Sorry for the noobishness, but would the encrypted folders also be password protected so they couldn't be accessed even if the person had the computer or drive?

 

[micropage7]

Thanks. Sorry for the noobishness, but would the encrypted folders also be password protected so they couldn't be accessed even if the person had the computer or drive?

so you want double protection
encrypt the drive and lock the folder?
if you encrypt the drive it should be safe since the whole package is encrypted
but if you want to lock, maybe you should instal folder lock again but i guess it would make your system little bit slower since your pc has to decrypt and unlock at the same time

 

[newtekie1]

Thanks. Sorry for the noobishness, but would the encrypted folders also be password protected so they couldn't be accessed even if the person had the computer or drive?

If you use bitlocker to encrypt the folder then it uses your Windows credentials to unlock the certificate store and allow you access to the folder. This means that they have to know your Windows password to log into Windows to gain access to the folder. Also, if they use one of those 3rd party password reset tools to change or reset your password the certificate store will reject the new credentials and not allow access to the folder. The same goes if they try to put the drive in another computer, there would be no way for them to read the encrypted folder. The only way this method would fail would be if you left your computer on and logged in, and someone walked up to it and started using it.

As for an encrypted Zip file using 7-zip, there is no way to access the data in the file without the password.

 

[kn00tcn]

what happens to bitlocker if your OS fails or if you want to move to a different OS, are you screwed like running out of DRM licenses?

 

[newtekie1]

what happens to bitlocker if your OS fails or if you want to move to a different OS, are you screwed like running out of DRM licenses?

You can(and should) create a backup of your certificate file and store it somewhere safe. When you do the backup of the certificate it asks you to password protect that as well, so anyone that finds the flashdrive/CD/DVD you back it up to can't use it.

 

[jasper1605]

Thanks guys, I think I'll go with using 7-zip then since it seems to give me some password protected options along with compression. Much appreciated!

 

[newtekie1]

Thanks guys, I think I'll go with using 7-zip then since it seems to give me some password protected options along with compression. Much appreciated!

Oh, I forgot to mention that if you stick with the .zip format, you can actually open the file in Windows without the need to use 7-zip since Windows Explorer now has built in zip support, you just have to use 7-zip to create the file.

However, if you use the 7z format you can encrypt the file names too, so the names of the files can't be read.

 

[Jetster]

Just be careful with encryption software. Don't forget the password and dont just save it to a file on your PC and forget it. If a drive or system goes south you wont have the passkey. It happens