Linux

18.19    Encryption

Notebook computers and USB flash drives are often lost or stolen. What is often worse than the actual loss of the device is the fact that important data falls into the wrong hands: private files, SSH keys, company secrets, and so on. This is unnecessary. A relatively simple encryption of the file system is sufficient to effectively protect the data.

This section provides some background information on dealing with encrypted files and file systems.

As a rule, you can set up an encrypted file system when you install Linux. Encryption of already existing file systems at a later stage is not possible. (You can, however, encrypt new file systems, of course. I will present the required commands ahead.)

18.19.1    Encrypt Individual ...