Encrypted Containers/ Drives

Do encrypted containers, drives or partitions remain encrypted even if the
user doesn't log in? Meaning if someone sneaks into my computer and runs
Knoppix to also see my drives, will encryption still be intact or is it only
active if the user logs in like EFS.

Thanks.

cjjbl

In article <mA2vd.2584$> , "cjjbl" <> wrote:
>Do encrypted containers, drives or partitions remain encrypted even if the
>user doesn't log in? Meaning if someone sneaks into my computer and runs
>Knoppix to also see my drives, will encryption still be intact or is it only
>active if the user logs in like EFS.
>
>Thanks.


Container/partiton files are completed encrypted and
unreadable by any adversary when the computer is turned off -
that's the whole point. For that matter, this is also true of
EFS. (Its weakness, aside from the possibility of backdoors,
is that it is not OTF and can leak info from the encrypted files
to plaintext versions, etc.)

There have been some - very crude - systems (I put them in the
snake-oil category) which only inhibited booting a drive without
a password, but which did nothing to encrypt the data. These are
not worthy of mention except to dismiss them.

Regards,

nemo outis

cjjbl wrote:
> Do encrypted containers, drives or partitions remain encrypted even if the
> user doesn't log in? Meaning if someone sneaks into my computer and runs
> Knoppix to also see my drives, will encryption still be intact or is it only
> active if the user logs in like EFS.
>
> Thanks.
>
>
>
Encryption will obscure the data from casual access. When encrypting
the drive, ensure the encryption does not use the same password as your
login on the system and is in excess of 10 chars with at least 2 chars
of each of the 4 char sets. If you are using you system user password
to encrypt the data, on can simply decrypt the system SAM and have the
decryption key to access the data.
Winged

winged