How to encrypt an NTFS disk without losing any data - IMPORTANT!

hamedballz · 2021-08-15 09:41:09

Hello. I'm currently living in Afghanistan, and as you're already aware, the situation is getting very unpleasant, so I was thinking of safeguarding all my sensitive data inside a 2TB HDD with an NTFS format. I can't change the format since I don't have a spare HDD to move all the data to, and I'd like a maximum level of protection, but in a way that I can access the data anytime I want. Could you guide me through the process step-by-step? I don't want to mess anything up since the data is very vital. I hope you'll understand. I would try and do the encryption myself, but I don't want to risk losing all my data. As a side note, would there be a way to create a sort of dummy partition as a decoy, and disguise the other one?

Sorry if the post is somewhat political.

Slithery · 2021-08-15 10:06:13

I'm not sure if it's possible without moving all of the data off and reformatting. Anyway, this has nothing to do with Arch so you'd be better off asking on a Windows forum.

PS - Your data can't be important at all if you don't already have a backup, all hard drives fail at some point.

hamedballz · 2021-08-15 10:12:54

Slithery wrote:

I'm not sure if it's possible without moving all of the data off and reformatting. Anyway, this has nothing to do with Arch so you'd be better off asking on a Windows forum.
PS - Your data can't be important at all if you don't already have a backup, all hard drives fail at some point.

I'm using arch so I believe it is related to this forum.

SimonJ · 2021-08-15 10:41:27

hamedballz wrote:

I'm using arch so I believe it is related to this forum.

NTFS (New Technology File System) is a proprietary journaling file system developed by Microsoft.

ua4000 · 2021-08-15 11:07:08

If you don't want to re-format your NTFS, you can have a look at https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Data-a … le_methods - "Stacked filesystem encryption" might have a solution for you.

But without any backup I would not recommend to start any testing...

seth · 2021-08-15 13:03:42

You could also just create a disk image file, https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Dm-cry … _container

Sorry if the post is somewhat political.

Don't make it, then you don't have to feel sorry.
Just ask your question w/o the irrelevant dramatization.

progandy · 2021-08-16 09:56:06

If the disk is only filled less than 50%, you could probably use ntfsresize to shrink the ntfs partition, create an encrypted partition, and move the files, into that.

seth's suggestion is probably the best. Create a disk image file (the tomb utility in that wiki article seems to make it easy). If you do not have enough empty space to put everything into it, move some data into it and then grow it into the space you just freed by moving files. Keep some less important files outside.

Edit: cryptsetup reencrypt might be able to move the ntfs partition into a luks container, but I have no idea if that really works. As an alternative, maybe veracrypt can do an in-place encryption. In any case, you risk to lose data in case the conversion is interrupted or fails.
https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Dm-cry … filesystem

veracrypt also has an option for hidden volumes, but if you are forced to reveal the password of the dummy partition, the attackers might accidentally overwrite your data.

(Edit: removed response to a post now split from this topic)

Last edited by progandy (2021-08-16 12:30:52)

ua4000 · 2021-08-22 09:50:32

I forget to mention the simplest way:

move the sensitive data to a password protected zip or 7zip archive.
7zip can use AES-256 encryption and can be accessed from MS Windows as well.

If you have only limited storage space:
don't make a huge 7zip, make batches, e.g. organized by date or alphanumeric, after creating an archive make a integrity check, then delete the plain data and continue on to the next batch.

seth · 2021-08-22 12:06:25

The OP wrote:

I'd like a maximum level of protection, but in a way that I can access the data anytime I want

I guess this is why everyone was looking at some form of FS level encryption, otherwise you could also aes a tarball and end up w/ seemingly random data.
(Also I'm not sure whether you can encrypt zip or 7zip in a way that hides the names of the packaged, in case that's important)

Arch Linux

#1 2021-08-15 09:41:09

How to encrypt an NTFS disk without losing any data - IMPORTANT!

#2 2021-08-15 10:06:13

Re: How to encrypt an NTFS disk without losing any data - IMPORTANT!

#3 2021-08-15 10:12:54

Re: How to encrypt an NTFS disk without losing any data - IMPORTANT!

#4 2021-08-15 10:41:27

Re: How to encrypt an NTFS disk without losing any data - IMPORTANT!

#5 2021-08-15 11:07:08

Re: How to encrypt an NTFS disk without losing any data - IMPORTANT!

#6 2021-08-15 13:03:42

Re: How to encrypt an NTFS disk without losing any data - IMPORTANT!

#7 2021-08-16 09:56:06

Re: How to encrypt an NTFS disk without losing any data - IMPORTANT!

#8 2021-08-22 09:50:32

Re: How to encrypt an NTFS disk without losing any data - IMPORTANT!

#9 2021-08-22 12:06:25

Re: How to encrypt an NTFS disk without losing any data - IMPORTANT!

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