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Tips and tricks: Secure your data
Keeping your data private in the world of operating systems is next to impossible. This is particularly true in the case of PCs with multiple users, in homes, schools and offices. Chances of sensitive information falling in wrong hands increases as networks become more involved.
To counter this threat, there are several encryption tools available. Today we are going to take a look at some features of an easy to use freeware encryption utility called Cryptainer LE.
Cryptainer creates a virtual drive on your PC, which looks and behaves exactly like any other drive. You can simply drag and drop your confidential data in it, and when the virtual drive is unloaded, all the data apparently vanishes, since the secret drive no longer exists.
Note that with other tools that do not rely on drive mechanism, encrypted files remain visible making it obvious that somebody is creating seemingly unreadable stuff — a telltale sign which one must guard against in order to successfully keep the data secret.
This is not the case with Cryptainer and at any given time the stealth drive can be reloaded using a password making all the data visible again. You do not have to manually encrypt or password-protect individual files or folders because encryption and decryption is performed ‘on-the-fly’.
This means you always see data in normal un-encrypted form whenever the virtual drive is loaded. A virtual drive, or ‘vault’ as it is called, is stored as a single file which can be carried around.
Moreover, if this ‘vault’ is lost or stolen, nobody can gain access to the classified information because it would require your password to be supplied through Cryptainer.
Even if an attacker tries to trespass encryption using force, he will have to encounter Blowfish algorithm used in Cipher Block Chaining (CBC) mode with a block size of 64 bytes. With registered version of the tool, users get a choice between 448-bit Blowfish and industry standard AES (256 bits), which would theoretically require “more than the age of the universe for all the computers in the world working simultaneously to decipher an encrypted file”.
Basic operations
With just 2.7MB in size, downloading the programme is a breeze. Run the Setup. ‘Crypt- ainer Volume Details’ window will appear. Enter file name which will be used as virtual disk volume, enter a volume label, volume size (maximum 25MB in free version) and a password.
If password is lost or forgotten, there is no way to recover the information. So make sure that password is something that can be recalled easily.
Press ‘Proceed to Create Volume’ button. The main screen of Cryptainer LE screen with an interface similar to Windows Explorer will appear. Here, you may place files, using Windows Explorer to copy files into this volume. Once done, go to File > Unload Cryptainer Volume. Similarly, to load a volume, go to File > Load Cryptainer Volume. Additional volumes can be created using Tools > Additional Cryptainer Volumes. For each volume a separate file is created and one must remember the location of these files in order to load them back.
Sending secure mail
Using Tools > ‘Encrypt File to Send by Email’ you can turn the confidential data into a password-protected self-extracting EXE file or a SIT file. In the first case, the EXE file can be zipped (as EXE extension is blocked by mail systems) and sent across network (like the internet or email). The recipient can only extract the data if the password is already known. In the second case, a program De-Cypher-IT is required by the recipient to extract the data from SIT file.
Data on removable disks
If you cannot afford USB sticks with built-in security mechanisms, Cryptainer allows ‘Mobile Installation’. Go to Tools > ‘Install Cryptainer Mobile’ and select USB disk. Shut down the existing Cryptainer and start the one that is now installed as a standalone program on the removable disk, named CryptainerLEMobile.
Virtual drives can be created (with volume files residing on USB disk) exactly in the same way as done from the hard disk installation. But the added advantage is that the drives can be loaded on any PC, with or without Cryptainer.
Data security and confidentiality is often taken for granted or data are assumed to be secure enough before a major disaster occurs. Using an encryption program whenever required is one step towards keeping information private across networks.
nizar.ali@ gmail.com
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