Arch Linux

bzpnbx

Member

Registered: 2014-10-05

Posts: 35

Necessary to load aes & sha512 kernel modules before using cryptsetup?

In the ArchWiki (https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Dm … encryption), it mentions to be sure that the dm-crypt kernel module is loaded before using cryptsetup.

I did not see any mention of the need to manually load the cipher or hash (e.g., aes and sha512) kernel modules prior to cryptsetup use. I wanted to confirm that it is not necessary to manually load the aes and sha512 kernel modules prior to using cryptsetup.

I assume something (e.g., dbus) handles the loading of these modules as needed obviating the need to load them manually?

EscapedNull

Member

Registered: 2013-12-04

Posts: 129

Re: Necessary to load aes & sha512 kernel modules before using cryptsetup?

I think AES and sha512 functionality is embedded in the kernel (no module required). At least on my system, dm-crypt depends only on dm-mod, which has no dependencies. At any rate, modprobe(8) automatically satisfies dependencies unless one of them is missing. The easiest way to find out if dm-crypt will "just work" is to create a test container.

# fallocate -l 10M crypt.img
# losetup /dev/loop0 crypt.img
# cryptsetup luksFormat /dev/loop0

See also: modprobe(8), modinfo(8), lsmod(8)

clfarron4

Member

From: London, UK

Registered: 2013-06-28

Posts: 2,163

Website

Re: Necessary to load aes & sha512 kernel modules before using cryptsetup?

I think AES and sha512 functionality is embedded in the kernel (no module required). At least on my system, dm-crypt depends only on dm-mod, which has no dependencies.

IIRC, last time I did a LVM on LUKS, everything just worked. That said, it doesn't hurt to make sure the modules are loaded anyways by loading them yourself.

Last edited by clfarron4 (2014-11-07 17:43:44)

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