Full disk encryption on everything. My Servers, PCs etc. Gives me peace of mind that my data is safe even when the device is no longer in my control.
this post was submitted on 16 Jan 2025
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My laptops are encrypted in case they get stolen or someone gets access to them at uni.
I don't https://xkcd.com/538/
I'm convinced the chances of me losing access to the data are higher than encryption protecting it from a bad actor.
Let's be real, full disk encryption won't protect a running system and if someone has physical access and really wants it, encryption won't protect you from the $5 wrench either.
I do encrypt my phone data though, as someone running away with my phone is more realistic.
Who's gonna come at me with a $5 wrench because they really want my data, though? The attack I'm most likely to experience is someone stealing my laptop while I'm out traveling. That's what full filesystem encryption solves best.
Or per XKCD, where are they finding a wrench for $5??
Here's one for less than 4 USD. I imagine 150 mm in length would be sufficient.
Wow that's cheap!
Watch out crypt nerds!
Edit: crypto, not crypt! Leaving it 🧟♀️
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I'm not worried about getting raided by the KGB or anything like that, but break-ins happen and my computer equipment would be a prime target for theft.
I occasionally cycle my backup drives off-site, so I want those encrypted as well.
The cost of encryption is very close to zero, so I don't even entertain the question of whether I should encrypt or not. I just encrypt by default.
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I do not as I do not have any sensitive data and what data is sensitive are the digital documents which are securely encrypted by default via id card and its passwords.
If I start having something worth protecting I will turn on fedoras encryption. But until then anyone who manages to steal my 100 eur thinkpad and guess its password is welcome to try out linux and see if they like it I guess.
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I encrypt all my drives. Me and the people I know get occasionally raided by the police. Plus I guess also provides protection for nosy civilians who get their hands on my devices. Unlike most security measures, there is hardly any downside to encrypting your drives—a minor performance hit, not noticeable on modern hardware, and having to type in a password upon boot, which you normally have to do anyway.
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Its that simple.
I can expand my own creativity and store every thought and creative Art, without anybody being able to find out after my death or while someone raids me.
Maybe I stored an opinion against some president, and maybe the government changed its working, which allows police to raid someone for little suspection.
You never know if you ever have something to hide. While things are okay now and today, it might be highly illegal tomorrow.
Those are ideas. But generally its only about the feeling of privacy.
I encrypt my workstations and backups thereof on external devices. To protect against theft or a lazy state-level adversary
I have no significant private data on my disks. They can be wiped whether encrypted or not if they're stolen. And I like that in theory if my pc explodes I can recover the data with only the drive.
I encrypt everything, with unique complex passwords, that I have a safe mnemonic system for remembering and retrieving.
I do, laptops and workstations.
It's just too easy not to, and there's almost no downsides to it. (I only need to reboot, once a month or two.)
Well, unless you consider the possibility of forgetting the password a downside, so for that reason I keep the password in a password manager.
In case my laptop was stolen, there would quite a couple fewer things to worry about. Especially things like client's data which could be under NDA's, etc...
are you guys using the bios ssd encryption option or a software solution?
LUKS (I was assuming that's kind of implied, I don't think I ever thought of another way..)
I’m using LVM. The BIOS solution would be a bad idea because it would be more difficult to access the drive on other systems if you had to; LVM allows you to enter your password on other systems to decrypt.
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I don't wanna risk losing anything on the drive thats important .
May i suggest a technique for remembering the password?
write it down
but instead of writing down the password, write down questions that only you can reasonably answer. For example:
- what was the name of the first girl i kissed?
- where did i go to on summer camp?
- which special event happened there?
and the answer would be: "mary beach rodeo" or idk what. this way, you construct a password out of multiple words that each are an answer to a simple question.
Maybe I might try this, and am open to advice :)
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Yes. Encrypting your entire hard drive has basically been a tickbox in the Fedora installer for a long time now. No reason why I wouldn't do it. It's, easy, doesn't give me any problems and improves my devices security with defence-in-depth. No brainer.
It’s a smidge more difficult on Debian if you want to use a non-ext4 filesystem - granted for most people, ext4’s probably still fine. I use it on my desktop, which doesn’t have encryption.
My Laptop and Phone have encrypted drives, my Desktop doesn't.
I use encryption on laptops, because they can be stolen in the train, bus, etc. On work desktop, I do so as well, because there are many people around. However, on everything that stay at home, I prefer not to use it to simplifiy things and get more performance.