Cryptmount

Infobox Software
name = cryptmount



caption =
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author = RW Penney
developer =
released =
latest release version = 3.1
latest release date = October 3, 2008
latest preview version =
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frequently updated =
programming language = C
operating system = Linux
platform =
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language = English, French
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genre = Disk encryption
license = GNU General Public License
website = http://cryptmount.sf.net/

cryptmount is a software tool for managing encrypted file systems under the GNU/Linux family of operating systems. It uses the device mapper and dm-crypt infrastructure to provide transparent encryption of file systems stored in disk partitions or within ordinary files.

The main features of cryptmount are as follows:
* Filesystems can be (un)mounted whenever needed by ordinary users, without requiring superuser/administrator privileges
* Multiple encrypted filesystems can be stored within a single disk partition
* Configuration information about encrypted filesystems is stored within a free-format human-readable file
* Access keys can be protected by a wide range of encryption and hashing algorithms provided by the [http://directory.fsf.org/project/libgcrypt libgcrypt] library
* Access keys can be compatible with the OpenSSL command-line tool, and be stored & backed-up separately from the filesystem that they protect
* Encrypted swap partitions are supported, and can be configured automatically on system boot-up
* An interactive setup script is supplied to allow basic, but effective, encrypted file systems to be created

Design choices

The design of cryptmount has been driven by a number of choices:
* It should be possible for rarely used encrypted filesystems to be left normally unmounted, but easily made visible when needed
* The setup of loopback devices needed to access encrypted filesystems within ordinary files should occur as transparently as possible
* Any user who knows the access password for an encrypted filesystem should be able to mount it when needed
* There is little value in obscuring information about the choice of encryption algorithm if that information is freely available to anyone who already has superuser privileges — i.e. textual configuration files to which only root has access are not significantly less secure than fixed-format binary information embedded within a disk partition.
* Only a single access password should be allowed on any encrypted filesystem — so that all users who control access to the filesystem have a shared interest in having a strong password, without any individual being able to choose their own a weak password.

External links

* [http://cryptmount.sourceforge.net/ Official website]
* [http://sourceforge.net/projects/cryptmount/ cryptmount] on SourceForge.net