How to encrypt disk transparently without destroying data

Posted by aseq on Server Fault See other posts from Server Fault or by aseq
Published on 2012-12-13T02:35:08Z Indexed on 2012/12/13 5:06 UTC
Read the original article Hit count: 363

Filed under:

linux

|

encryption

On a Linux system, be it Debian, Redhat or any distro, I would like to encrypt the disk on the fly.

That is, encrypt the disk transparently to the OS whilst it is running, reboots, shuts down etc. In addition it should not destroy data. I know there is (commercial) software for windows that does it. But I need a Linux solution.

The solutions I know of do not support this as far as I can see (luks, truecrypt...). Maybe there is some hack or work around available?

© Server Fault or respective owner

Related posts about linux

apt-get install and update fail

as seen on Ask Ubuntu - Search for 'Ask Ubuntu'
I've got a problem with apt-get update and apt-get install ... commands . every time update or installing fails and errors are : Get:1 http://dl.google.com stable Release.gpg [198B] Ign http://dl.google.com/linux/chrome/deb/ stable/main Translation-en_US Get:2 http://dl… >>> More
kernel module compiling error

as seen on Ask Ubuntu - Search for 'Ask Ubuntu'
sh@ubuntu:/home/ccpp/helloworld$ make gcc-4.6 -O2 -DMODULE -D_KERNEL_ -W -Wall -Wstrict-prototypes -Wmissing-prototypes -isystem /lib/modules/`uname -r`/build/include -c -o hello-1.o hello-1.c hello-1.c:4:0: warning: "MODULE" redefined [enabled by default] <command-line>:0:0: note: this is… >>> More
Build-Essentials installation failing

as seen on Ask Ubuntu - Search for 'Ask Ubuntu'
I am having trouble accessing the several critical header files that show to be a part of the build process. The "Ubuntu Software Center" shows "Build Essentials" as installed: Next I did the following two commands, which did not improve the problem: ~$ sudo apt-get install build-essential [sudo]… >>> More
Updating Debian kernel

as seen on Super User - Search for 'Super User'
I'm trying to update my Debian machine to 2.6.32-46 (which is the new stable). However, after doing apt-get update my apt-cache search linux-image shows me: linux-headers-2.6.32-5-486 - Header files for Linux 2.6.32-5-486 linux-headers-2.6.32-5-686-bigmem - Header files for Linux 2.6.32-5-686-bigmem linux-headers-2… >>> More
Serial connection over a single USB cable (Windows to linux, or linux to linux)

as seen on Server Fault - Search for 'Server Fault'
I'm helping out with a project for an embedded device that only has USB and no serial. This device is running Linux. These days, when we need to connect to a serial port on a device we typically use a USB to serial adapter (on something like a phone system or a load balancing device, etc). I would… >>> More

Related posts about encryption

SQL SERVER – History of SQL Server Database Encryption

as seen on SQL Authority - Search for 'SQL Authority'
I recently met Michael Coles and Rodeney Landrum the author of one of the kind book Expert SQL Server 2008 Encryption at SQLPASS in Seattle. During the conversation we ended up how Microsoft is evolving encryption technology. The same discussion lead to talking about history of encryption tools in… >>> More
Encryption is hard: AES encryption to Hex

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
So, I've got an app at work that encrypts a string using ColdFusion. ColdFusion's bulit-in encryption helpers make it pretty simple: encrypt('string_to_encrypt','key','AES','HEX') What I'm trying to do is use Ruby to create the same encrypted string as this ColdFusion script is creating. Unfortunately… >>> More
Encryption Product Keys : Public and Private key encryption

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
I need to generate and validate product keys and have been thinking about using a public/private key system. I generate our product keys based on a client name (which could be a variable length string) a 6 digit serial number. It would be good if the product key would be of a manageable length… >>> More
Confused about encryption with public and private keys (which to use for encryption)

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
I am making a licensing system when clients ask my server for a license and I send them a license if they are permitted to have one. On my current system I encrypt the license using a single private key and have the public key embedded into the client application that they use to decrypt the license… >>> More
Software tools to automatically decrypt a file, whose encryption algorithm (and/or encryption keys)

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
I have an idea for encryption that I could program fairly easily to encrypt some local text file. Given that my approach is novel, and does not use any of the industry standard encryption techniques, would I be able to test the strength of my encryption using 'cracker' apps or suchlike? Or do all… >>> More