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Ask HN: How do you encrypt your laptops?

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Re: Ask HN: How do you encrypt your laptops?

#41
post #29

I just use Truecrypt 7.1a, and encrypt the entire drive, so it requires a password before booting.

Does this affect performance? Esp for things like photoshop?

I use Photoshop daily, and play some Steam games once in a while. My laptop is an ultrabook with a SSD. I can't see any impact on performance. If there is an impact, I'd need to setup benchmarks to identify it.

Re: Ask HN: How do you encrypt your laptops?

#42

Yup, encrypt every time. Otherwise, they may be able to snag your SSH RSA keys off of the hard drive, and if you've password protected it, they can try to brute force it. Also, it helps safeguard against border patrol wanting to access your data while traveling.

Store your keys on a hardware token to reduce the chances of this happening (Nitrokey, Yubikey, OpenPGP smart card, etc.)

Re: Ask HN: How do you encrypt your laptops?

#43
post #38
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That sounds like an annoyance, not encryption to me.

It reminds me of how I set a boot password in the BIOS on my HP laptop. I now have forgot the admin password in order to remove that "feature". I have no idea how I can fix it. The laptop is bricked. I can't install Linux on it because it is set not to boot from USB or CD/ROM

> I have no idea how I can fix it.

Just disconnect the CMOS batteries; you can find tutorials online. Or you can take it to a computer shop, it should be a simple fix.

Re: Ask HN: How do you encrypt your laptops?

#44
post #22
post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand... If you've got the requisite ecryptfs packages installed, you can just run something like: "adduser --encrypt-home newusername" and there you go. It works on top of any filesystem, because it encrypts on a per-file basis.

Yeah, but (last time I installed) that wasn't an option at install time.

Ubuntu has that as an install-time feature, but then Ubuntu is definitely not Debian.

Then again, Debian isn't really either given the systemd fiasco that is Jessie.

How has that whole debacle impacted you? I still have several squeeze(or whatever oldstable / jessie-1 is) boxes that I'm loathe to upgrade, and considering just biting the bullet and switching to either Ubuntu, which has a more mature systemd seutp, or some other distro entirely (OpenSUSE seems to be the place to be when it comes to bleeding edge secure rolling releases), but the familiarity I have for Debian continues to make that difficult to make the leap.

Re: Ask HN: How do you encrypt your laptops?

#46
post #25
post #17

I use the standard hardware encryption of my SSD (a Samsung 830 in my 2012-era Dell XPS 13), which requires I enter the passphrase when I turn my machine on. Advantages: - OS neutral - Seemingly as fast as running 'unencrypted' (I assume performance is identical, the only difference being the passphrase is stored in my head rather than the BIOS) Disadvantages: - Limited to an 8-char (!) ASCII passphrase - I've no ide…

That sounds like an annoyance, not encryption to me.

You're correct, it's not going to stop someone who knows exactly what they're doing and has the time/patience/tools to brute force. But it is enough to stop casual thieves from stealing more than just hardware, which is (fortunately) my main concern.

Re: Ask HN: How do you encrypt your laptops?

#47
on OS X I use FileVault2. I also have data on encrypted, password protected disk images. A firmware password on the machine too.

Another thought, what other things could someone do?

check for the existence of a USB stick or SD card plugged into the machine inorder to actually mount home? Log user into a chroot env and mount nothing unless a usb stick exists?

Re: Ask HN: How do you encrypt your laptops?

#49
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That sounds like an annoyance, not encryption to me.

It's the 8-char password that I find absurd - that would take about 2 hours to brute force max.

I think hdd will wipe itself after N incorrect attempts.

Re: Ask HN: How do you encrypt your laptops?

#50
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, but (last time I installed) that wasn't an option at install time.

Ubuntu has that as an install-time feature, but then Ubuntu is definitely not Debian. Then again, Debian isn't really either given the systemd fiasco that is Jessie. How has that whole debacle impacted you? I still have several squeeze(or whatever oldstable / jessie-1 is) boxes that I'm loathe to upgrade, and considering just biting the bullet and switching to either Ubuntu, which has a more mature systemd seutp, or…

Can you write more about systemd fiasco in Jessie?

I've very reluctantly upgraded to Jessie with systemd few months ago and, to my surprise, it simply works.

Cursory googling returned entries from 1-2 years ago, so my google fu is not sufficient.

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