One tip to avoid the pitfall of loosing access to all your file: Backup! No excuses for forgetting your password, but if that XML files damaged or deleted you need a backup of your files somewhere safe (outside of BoxCryptor) in the same way you’d need a backup in the event of a drive failure. If you want to hide files from people that can access to your computers (either at home, work or at the thieves hideout), then don’t configure the mount drive to automatically remember the passwords. If you want to just hide your files from Dropbox, just use the defaults. If you’re an author and you last manuscript is encrypted, it won’t get published unless you’ve made provisions for your heirs to unlock it.Īnd it’s important how you configure BoxCryptor. If a husband encrypts all his financial records and then dies, his wife won’t be able to see them. If your documents are very important you might want to put your passwords and keys into your will. If you encrypt your life its very important how you handle the password and configuration key. If something happens to your machine and you want to recover your files from a backup to a new machine, you’ll need that configuration key file. When you encrypted a folder with BoxCryptor or TrueCrypt you’ll have to create a strong password that you must not forget, and you’ll be required to save a configuration key file that you should backup carefully. You have to decide if its worth the effort. Criminals encrypt files because they don’t want the police or FBI use them as evidence. Still other people encrypt files because they don’t want people at home or at the office to mess with their stuff. Other people encrypt their documents because they’re afraid their computers will be stolen and bad guys will steal their identity. Some people encrypt files because they worry that Cloud storage sites might peek at the good bits in their private files. If you’re paranoid about who can see your files you’ll need to think about encryption.Įncryption takes extra work, extra precautions and can be a very risky endeavor if you’re careless. Dropbox is a good way to do that, but Dropbox stores your files in the Cloud. It’s our responsibility to back up our digital life. We’re moving into an age where all our personal information is digital. Using encryption is not for the unfocused mind or scatterbrain user. Wow-wee – just thinking about all this makes me nervous. Delete it and access to your files are long gone too. Also, there’s a file listing in your BoxCryptor folder called. Unless you’re a master NSA hacker, you’ll have no chance of ever opening them again. If you forget your password, kiss those precious documents goodbye. It appears if you buy the full version ($44.99), it will encrypt the filenames too, if you want.Įncrypting your files can be dangerous. And evidently, with the free version, you’ll see the filenames unencrypted, they just won’t open. If you don’t mount the drive and browse to the BoxCryptor folder within Dropbox you’ll see your files, but they won’t open. After you install BoxCryptor you mount the drive and use this access point to see the files unencrypted. It works with Dropbox, SkyDrive and other cloud drive services, as well as regular drives. Save something to its drives and it’s automatically encrypted. BoxCryptor encrypts file by file, so the overhead for Dropbox is much lighter.īoxCryptor is free for personal use as long as you only create one virtual drive. Doing some Google research I discovered BoxCryptor. Dropbox sees TrueCrypt as a single file, so if you have a gigabyte of data locked down, that’s a lot for Dropbox to handle over the internet. It’s a scary subject because if you’re not careful you’ll lock all your critical files into an encrypted volume and you won’t be able to open it again.Īt first I thought I just set up a TrueCrypt volume inside of Dropbox, but I read there were some issues with that. We’re being forced to use TrueCrypt and BitLocker at work, so I was having to learn about this topic anyway. Before Windows times out and locks my machine, people could see my home files in Dropbox, so I felt it was the time to study encryption programs. However, I started thinking what would happen if someone came into my office when I just had stepped out. Normally Dropbox encrypts your files for transfer over the net and at their storage site, and I’ve considered that good enough security. So I’m being forced to encrypt my own documents. We’re not allowed to store sensitive data on our local drives, and my own files will set off their security scanner. Because my Dropbox files are replicated to all my machines at home and work this has caused a security problem at work. I set up Dropbox to use as my primary drive for all my digital document filing. In my never ending quest to get organized, I’ve been forced to explore the world of encryption.
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