Mastering Linux Security and Hardening

Encrypting other directories with eCryptfs

Encrypting other directories is a simple matter of mounting them with the ecryptfs filesystem. For our example, let's create a secrets directory in the top level of our filesystem, and encrypt it. Note how you list the directory name twice, because you also need to specify a mount point. (Essentially, you're using the directory that you're mounting as its own mount point.)

sudo mkdir /secretssudo mount -t ecryptfs /secrets /secrets

The output from this command is a bit lengthy, so let's break it down.

First, you'll enter your desired passphrase, and choose the encryption algorithm and the key length:

donnie@ubuntu2:~$ sudo mount -t ecryptfs /secrets /secrets[sudo] password for donnie:Passphrase: ...