Re: I really do like OS X but . . .

foo@xxxxxxx wrote: 
On Mon, 02 Jan 2006 20:56:52 -0500, TheLetterK
<theletterk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:



doesn't have it. Lose both passwords and the data's as good as gone;
do any of you guys use this? 

Filesystem encryption? On some machines. Laptop, definitely.


Anyhow, XP Pro's encryption is fuller featured than what OS X offers.
It appears OS X only allows you to secure your home folder via the GUI
(and turns it into one file - if it corrupts, your data is dead in the
water).

Which is all you need to encrypt. What sort of data outside of your home directory, would you even conceivably need to secure? Logs maybe? When *all* of your personal data is stored in the home directory, why would you need to encrypt anything other than your home directory? This is almost as silly as saying "XP can only encrypt data if it's on an NTFS drive".


XP can encrypt data on any drive, anywhere.

If the drive is formatted as an NTFS 5 drive. It's a function of the filesystem, not XP itself.

 That means you can
encrypt data on the fileserver.   You can encrypt data on other local
drives.   You don't have the 'home drive' limitation like OS X does.


It's not much of a limitation.

Any file you have access to, you can encrypt.  The user doesn't need
to care about location.

And neither do OS X users. You don't put personal data anywhere other than the home directory, or possibly an external drive--in which case you can use an encrypted disk image.




XP Pro encrypts on a file-by-file basis, can encrypt files outside of
the user's home directory, and has rules to permit an enterprise setup
(enterprise user accounts can be created that have rights to decrypt
computers' files in the domain).

And OS X allows users to create encrypted disk images--something XP does not.


I think most would find the method OS X uses for disk images to be
less useful than XP's. XP's is certainly cleaner - just do a
properties/advanced/encrypt - dead simple, and no jumping thru hoops
to make a disk image.

And it's also limited to NTFS 5 partitions. OS X can make an encrypted disk image on any partition it can write to.



How to encrypt files in OS X, outside of home folder:
http://www.askdavetaylor.com/how_can_i_secure_encrypt_folders_on_my_macs_usb_flash_drive.html
(The file is now essentially an archive file, useless for daily
usage.)

Well ***, I can answer that question. Put an encrypted, rewritable disk image on the flash drive. Solved! Don't even need third party utilities 


In what I'd consider a clumsy manner, yes.  Much like the original
encrypted disks in FAT in DOS5.0 days, which literally made one huge
single file of the entire partition.  Why would you want to do it this
way, rather than by XP's by-file method?

A) You don't have to take up the whole drive with one big disk image.
B) If you think encryption isn't useful for home users, then I guarantee you that the reliability difference between the two methods is completely irrelevant.



for it. I would like to point out that XP doesn't support encryption on external drives, unless the drives have been formatted as NTFS.


Why wouldn't one use NTFS? Should one post warnings when not using
HFS+, OS X's default FS?

OS X will still encrypt the home directory, even if you use UFS. It's encrypted disk images will still be encrypted on UFS drives, Fat32 drives, Fat16 drives, or anything else it can write to. XP can't encrypt anything if it's not on an NTFS 5 partition.

As for why you would not use NTFS... Well, if you dual boot with Linux, or have a Mac that shares the drive (common for Mac/PC users with external hard drives), then you'll want at least one commonly readable partition.



The page talks about using proprietary software dependent on
USB drive manufacturer, and talks about putting a Mac filevault file
on the media itself (of a predetermined size, apparently).


Should have had me answering these sorts of questions.


Oh, and
Apple's had problems with this, too:
http://www.macworld.com/news/2003/11/03/filevaultissue/index.php?redirect=1067924494000
It was fixed in early November, but issues like that make me pause and
rethink if I really want to put all of my critical files in a single
large file and hope nothing bad happens.

This was fixed back in 2003.


...which is what I wrote. But users lost data. 

You seemed to imply that it was fixed this last November.



How to do so in XP (Pro):
Right click on the file(s) in question, properties, advanced, encrypt.
It's been in use and availble for roughly 6 years now, reliably.

And still not available in XP Home, which was what I originally claimed. No need to try to switch subjects. 


I've since been over this with several posters.  It's always
interesting to get different opinions.



--
"There is nothing I understand." - ***
.