Not many PCs have TPM chips in them though, they tend to be found mostly in high-end business laptops so we need to turn to other solutions.  There are third-party soutions like Laplink’s PC Lock and that old favourite TrueCrypt.  For many people though a good alternative is EFS (Encrypted File System) which has been a part of Windows since Windows 2000.

This is an excellent cryptography utility, able to encrypt and decrypt on the fly.  You can set folders to be automatically encrypted, including all their sub-folders and files.  If you then pair this with a password on your copy of Windows it makes the files pretty impregnable, even if they are stored on a different physical hard disk to your copy of Windows.

There are problems however, people can still see the full file names of the files, and the folder structure, but there’s no way they can be opened.

You might also find that there’s no way for you to open them either unless you back up your encryption key.  You can do this by typing the word encrypt into the Start Menu search box and selecting Manage file encryption certificates from the results that appear.

You can use this wizard to back up your encryption key for EFS.  It’s helpful too and will talk you through the procedure.  You should always keep your EFS key in a safe unencrypted location.  Personally I store mine in the cloud as not only do I then know it’s unencrypted, but I also know it’s a long way from my PC should anybody steal the machine.

There are problems with EFS Encrypted files though and I thought I’d deal with one of the biggest ones here, and something that you might not know is even affecting you.  Many people these days like to keep backsups of their data on either USB attached hard disks or Network Attached Storage (NAS) drives.

You’d assume that because these drives aren’t a physical part of your own computer, and because they’re external to the PC that anything you store there will be unencrypted and you can then, not only read the files on another PC, but also restore them in the event of a disaster and you lose your EFS key.  You might find though that when time comes to read the files that you can’t!

EFS is only supported on NTFS formatted drives, which is the default disk format option for Windows. If you try and copy an encrypted file to a disk that’s not formatted this way, such as a USB Pen Drive, then Windows will ask you if you want to copy the file without encryption. A problem arises though because EFS can’t tell the difference between internal and external NTFS formatted disks. If you have a USB hard disk or a NAS drive that’s formatted with NTFS (and with many NAS drives you may have been given no indication by the configuration software what file format type it’s used) then the encryption will also be copied with the file.

Thus if you lose your encryption key, or if something else goes wrong, then you’ll not only lose access to the files on your hard drive, but you’ll also lose access to your backup copy too.

It’s a warning that EFS doesn’t tell you about and it’s a mistake I’ve seen too many people make, including myself once which just goes to show how easy it is for a problem to occur. If you want to guarantee that you always have access to your files using EFS, make certain that you always keep an up to date copy of your encryption key in a safe place, and then all should always be well.

Today, LapLink have announced their new PC Lock software.  This takes the task of encrypting your files and data to the next logical level and adds some interesting features.

According to research conducted by Ponemon Institute, Gartner and Intel, over 1,700 laptops are stolen every day and someone’s identity is stolen every 2 seconds. Files on a PC that are not encrypted are at constant danger of theft, increasing the user’s risk of identity theft, privacy invasion and significant financial loss.

It uses “a sophisticated EKE ‘Encrypted Key Encryption’ approach with military-grade 256-bit Advanced Encryption Standard (AES)” to secure your data but in addition to the software on your PC which encrypts and decrypts files on the fly, there’s a cloud management console too.

With this unique console, users can modify preferences, change settings, reset passwords, lock the data on a missing or stolen PC and remotely delete sensitive data. The Web Management Console is accessible from any web-enabled device, including smartphones, allowing management from virtually anywhere, even if the user is on the go; no need to rely on live customer support as with other products.

This is a very interesting approach meaning that you still have control of your data, and can securely erase it, if you lose your laptop or if your PC is stolen.  You will also be able to rest safe in the knowledge that the thief won’t have had access to the data in the interim because the files aren’t unlocked by your Windows log-in.

Files and folders on a PC remain protected even if the PC is lost or stolen. Users can trigger a remote wipe of their encrypted data from the Web Management Console, preventing access of stolen files. Even if the thief pulls the hard drive from the PC and never accesses the Internet, the data remains encrypted and inaccessible. PC Lock is also compatible with other security software, so it can provide an extra layer of protection and complement existing safeguards a user may already have in place or add in the future.

The main encryption software is run from a wizard which takes you through the process of encrypting your files and configuring the PC’s data.  The encryption takes place in the background and you won’t notice any degradation in performance on a standard home or business PC, as you shouldn’t these days.

Then for those of you in business, maybe a small business where you need to protect sensitive customer and user data how about these cherries on the cake?

Behavior Monitoring
PC Lock automatically takes steps to protect your encrypted data when it senses an unauthorized user. If someone repeatedly fails to login, PC Lock detects successive failures and will automatically take steps to protect encrypted data. These steps include destroying essential elements of the decryption key rendering access to the data impossible.

Protects against “Cold Boot Attacks”
The “Cold Boot” phenomenon occurs because other encryption software leaves encryption keys in RAM even when a PC is password protected by a screen saver, sleeping or hibernating. PC Lock deletes keys and overwrites them with random data during transitions to other power states ensuring they cannot be recovered in a cold boot situation.

Protects against Hackers
The PC Lock password is separate and different than the Windows password. So, even if a hacker is able to login to your Windows user account, they will also have to know your PC Lock password to unlock your data, which if they fail at guessing a set number of times (determined by the user in the Web Management Console) then PC Lock will trigger the key deletion to protect your data.

I like this approach as I’ve always been uneasy about EFS having lost data to it about 10 years ago.  The thought of having encryption that’s tied to your Windows log-in on a specific computer is a bit dangerous so I’ll certainly be giving LapLink PC Lock a try.  The additional peace of mind of having the web console with remote wipe access is an extra bonus.

LapLink has been around for decades now and made it’s name with hardware crossover serial cables that allowed you to easily transfer files from one computer to another (this was in the days before modern networks).  Now to celebrate the company’s 28th anniversary they’re giving away PC Lock completely free for 24 hours (Monday 16th May 2011).  After that it will be available at a discounted rate of $14.95 for a period before returning to the full retail price of $29.99.

If you value your data and keep personal files on your home or work PC or on your laptop or tablet then you should grab PC Lock while its free, you can get it here at www.laplink.com/pclock.  We all keep personal files on our computers and the thought of being able to log into a cloud management console on my smartphone and remotely wipe a device makes this not just a bargain, but potentially the software we must all have on our computers.

He has to select the folder from which the files are copied – subfolders are automatically included in the process -, a destination drive or folder, a size that should be copied and the file extension. The first two are obvious while the latter two require a short explanation. Size defines the total size of all files that are copied. If you pick for instance 1000 Megabyte as the size and mp3 as the file extension mp3 files with a total size of about 1000 Megabytes will be copied, never more than that of course to avoid the dreaded disk is full message.

The file extension can be any file extension which means you can also copy avi files, documents, images or anything else that you can think of randomly to the folder or hard drive.It is furthermore possible to add additional file extensions with the “;” separator.

Two optional check boxes are available: Clear Destination Dir deletes all files in the destination dir so that it is empty before the copy begins. Replace Existing Files overwrites existing files without asking during the copying.

The configuration can be saved and loaded which is nice if you want to use the program every now and then to load new files on the device. It is even possible to use it once every day before going to school to start the day with a fresh random selection of your music.

Mix2Stix requires Java which has to be installed on the system. The source is included in the distribution.

After all of this is done right-click a file, folder or drive and select Change Icon from the context menu. A window pops up showing the path to the file, folder or drive. You will have to choose a icon library, some of which can be loaded from the developers page, and all the icons of that library will be displayed.

Just click on the icon that you want to use and use the optional “Use icon for all files of that type” if you wish that as well. Changes will be visible immediately and you can repeat the process if you don’t like the icon anymore.

Private mode means that only trusted users that have been added by you can access the file server. You will have to change the settings from easy mode to expert to be able to create accounts for those users. Once that is done you access the user management by clicking on Menu -> Other Options -> User Accounts. Once you have created at least one user account you right click on files or folders that you have added to your file server and select restrict access and choose the username(s) that you have just created.

Another possibility would be to protect the folders and files directly without using user accounts. You have to assign a username and password to the file or folder and every user that tries to access it will be asked for this data.

HTTP File Server is highly configurable: You can set connection limits, speed limits and ban IPs from accessing your server.

This tool is great if you need to exchange files fast and have no time to setup something else. Alternatives would be to use an ftp client like FileZilla or a local Apache server with htaccess. Another option that I personally do not like that much is use file hosts to share files. I never liked the idea to send my sensible files to a third party. It does not really matter if it is encrypted or password protected or not, call me paranoid, hehe.

The message that appears reads: “All download slots (number) assigned to your country (name) are in use. Several ways to bypass the country limit exist and I would like to explain two of them and hint to others that can also be used if the need arises. The first one has been around for a while. You do need to download the User Agent Switcher add-on for Firefox or edit the registry in Windows if you are using the Internet Explorer.
Firefox:

Click on Tools, User Agent Switcher and select Options.. Options from the menu. Click on User Agents in the new tab and then on ADD. It is only important to fill out the first two fields. Name the first any way you want, Megaupload for instance. Copy and Paste the following line in the second field.

Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1; SV1; Alexa Tool bar)

Internet Explorer:

I strongly advise to use Firefox instead but if you really want to do this in Internet Explorer you have to edit the registry. For IE7 and IE6 navigate to the following registry key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\InternetSettings\User Agent\Post Platform.

Right-Click Post Platform and select New String Value and name it Alexa Toolbar.

Firefox users need to switch to the User Agent that they have created before they click on a download link. Do this by clicking on Tools, User Agent Switcher and choosing the name (megaupload) that you entered during the creation.

The second method would be to enter the megaupload website indirectly by using a service that does not reveal where you are coming from. Two services that come to my mind are Google translate and anonym.to

Zamzar offers four different format categories which are: document, image, movie and music. Each category has a large list of formats that can be converted into each other. The following can be converted on the website:

• text formats: csv, doc, odp, ods, odt, pdf, ppt and xls.
• image formats: bmp, gif, jpg, tiff, ps
• music fomats: ac3, au, flac, m4a, mp3, wav, wma
• movie formats: avi, flv, gvi, mov, mp4, mpg

As you can see there are plenty of possiblities to convert formats into each other. The maximum file limit is 100 megabytes which should be sufficient for most purposes.

Similar sites that can help you as well are processlibrary.com and neuber.com. I recommend this procedure to every windows user. Fire up your taskmanager and search for every filename that you don´t know. Takes only a few minutes and gives you the possibility to get rid of some processes that are not useful or even malicious.

[tags]windows, file, filename, virus, trojan, unkown file[/tags]