I have a password for my windows login but i’m looking to also password encrypt certain folders which contain important information.
I work at a place where many people come in and out and sometime I’ll jump up from my desk to get coffee etc. It would be a pain to logoff and logon everytime i get up for 2 minutes.
Perhaps a programs? Maybe it’s in windows already?
Depends on how easily you want to be able to access these files and folders.
microsoft office and some other programs have password options built in for their file types… these won’t work on folders, and I’m not sure how good the security generally is.
A more general option is to use a file compression tool, like winzip or winrar, to store the files or folders. These both have password encryption options i believe.
Sure, there a bunch of encryption programs to do this. One good, free one I use is AxCrypt.
Instead of logging off, why don’t you just lock your machine?
There are numerous utilities out there that can crack a MS office password in about 3 seconds flat.
like anything its more a matter of effort level you wish to repel. Given an hour and an external drive, if there was data i wanted to pry into on your drive I would just image your drive to an external and walk away to dig and decrypt at my leisure.
If you are dealing with any kind of tryly sensitive information perhaps something like a USB encryption key might be workable.
http://esvc000318.wic001ss.server-shop.com/store/viewItem.shop?idProduct=56
They aren’t free but can tie areas of a hard drive to the piece of USB hardware being present. Just pull the key and stick it in your pocket when you walk away.
The benefit here is you are better protected if someone wanted to get creative on a day off or something. Of course assuming your workplace has an IT dept they will not like this and you may not even be able to install it.
If this is work related infomation maybe you should be contacting your IT people about additional security. If you are trying to hide it from the IT people, forget it now and stop doing it, they will find and access anything they have sufficent motivation to access.
If locking isn’t adequate, maybe this: http://www.truecrypt.org/
I only played with it a bit, but it was highly recommended to me.
I use this and it works great! Basically it saves files into a pre-defined encrypted file that is mapped as a drive. It supports many different encryptions methods and also allows multiple encryption volumes to be accessed at the same time. It is easy to use too.
I’ve been using encrypted magic folders for a while, and I like it a lot. Not only does it encrypt your data, it also hides it away from just about every other tool (including the system).
But those are cumbersome to use. A file compressor will create an archive folder which you can password protect if you want. But they don’t delete the original folder. So you’d have to compress your folder, delete it, empty your waste bin, and unpack the archive every time you want to access the data in it. I guess what the OP asks for is just a tool that requires password verification every time you open a folder.
I’ve used something called Drivecrypt in the past, but when I did a google search, the resulting page didn’t look at all familiar.
Here’s another endorsement of TrueCrypt. I keep all my sensitive data on my work laptop in a large TrueCrypt volume.
Another vote for Truecrypt.
Truecrypt is awesome!
XP Professional has encyption available as an option on folders or specific files.
Have you thought about just making them hidden folders and hiding them before you leave your desk? This won’t stop anyone that knows you have hidden folders, but at least they won’t be visible to a casual browser.
The best solution is just to hit Windows+L when you walk away. It locks your workstation requiring your password to get back in. Anyone with Admin rights can unlock it(actually it logs you out), but that will force all your programs to close so they can’t tell what you had open.
-Otanx
Are any of these good for Macintosh?
Mac OS X, as always, has a built-in solution for this. Open up Disk Utility in the Applications->Utilities folder, click the “New Image” button on the toolbar, and select AES-128 from the encryption dropdown.
If the encryption you are talking about is the ones talked about here I don’t think it helps in the OPs situation. I just tried this an while I assume the files are encrypted when I am logged in I can see them easily so someone can pop into my office while I am out and see the encrypted things. Does the mac stuff require a separate password?
And even TrueCrypt will allow anyone to access your private information, if you’ve mounted the volume, and simply walked away from your PC. There is no security solution to handing someone the “keys” to your machine without your supervision.
But with TrueCrypt, an admin can’t access the encrypted data, unlike with XP Pro’s built-in encryption. What I’m concerned about is having my laptop stolen, and protecting my work data in that case. Without my password, the TrueCrypt data is completely safe.