Comparison of disk encryption software

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Technical feature comparison of different disk encryption software.


Contents

[edit] Background information

Name Developer Release date Licensing Operating system support Development status
BestCrypt Jetico 1993[1] Commercial, limited source code Linux 2.6, Windows NT-based, Windows 9x, Windows 3.1, MS-DOS Maintained
Sentry 2020 SoftWinter 1998[2] Commercial, closed source Windows NT-based, Pocket PC Actively developed
PGPDisk PGP Corporation 1998-09-01[3] Commercial, closed source Windows NT-based, Mac OS X Maintained
CrossCrypt Steven Scherrer 1999-06-09[4] Free, open source (GPL) Windows NT-based ?
DriveCrypt SecurStar GmbH 2001 Commercial, closed source Windows NT-based Maintained
CGD Roland C. Dowdeswell 2002-10-04[5] Free, open source (BSD) NetBSD 2.0+ Maintained
GBDE Poul-Henning Kamp 2002-10-19[6] Free, open source (BSD) FreeBSD 5.0+ Maintained
cryptoloop ? 2003-07-02[7] Free, open source (GPL) Linux 2.5–2.6 Deprecated, known vulnerabilities
TrueCrypt TrueCrypt Foundation 2004-02-02[8] Free, open source (custom) Linux 2.6, Windows NT-based Actively developed
dm-crypt/cryptsetup Christophe Saout 2004-03-11[9] Free, open source (GPL) Linux 2.6 Actively developed
FreeOTFE Sarah Dean 2004-10-10[10] Free, open source (custom) Windows NT-based, Pocket PC Actively developed
dm-crypt/LUKS Clemens Fruhwirth (LUKS) 2005-02-05[11] Free, open source (GPL) Linux 2.6 Actively developed
GELI Pawel Jakub Dawidek 2005-04-11[12] Free, open source (BSD) FreeBSD 6.0+ Maintained
CryptArchiver WinEncrypt ? Commercial, closed source Windows NT-based Maintained
n-Crypt Pro n-Trance Security Ltd 2005 Commercial, closed source Windows NT-based Maintained
Scramdisk Shaun Hollingworth ? Free, open source (custom) Windows 9x-based Unmaintained
SecuBox Aiko Solutions 2007-02-19[13] Commercial, closed source Windows CE, Windows Mobile Actively developed

[edit] Features

  • Hidden containers: Whether hidden containers can be created for deniable encryption. Note that some modes of operation can be more prone to watermarking attacks than others.
  • Pre-boot authentication: Whether authentication can be required before booting the computer, thus allowing one to encrypt the boot disk.
  • Custom authentication: Whether custom authentication mechanisms can be implemented with third-party applications.
  • Multiple keys: Whether an encrypted volumes can have more than one active key.
  • Passphrase strengthening: Whether key strengthening is used with plain text passwords to frustrate dictionary attacks, usually using PBKDF2.
  • Hardware acceleration: Whether dedicated cryptography acceleration extension cards can be taken advantage of.
Name Hidden containers Pre-boot authentication Custom authentication Multiple keys Passphrase strengthening Hardware acceleration
BestCrypt Yes Yes No Yes[14] ? No
Sentry 2020 No No No ? ? No
PGPDisk No Yes[15] ? Yes Yes[16] ?
CrossCrypt No No No No No No
DriveCrypt Yes[17] Yes No Yes Yes No
CGD No No Yes[18] Yes[19] Yes[18] No
GBDE No No[20] Yes Yes[21] No[21] No[20]
cryptoloop No Yes[22] Yes No No Yes
TrueCrypt Yes No No No Yes No
dm-crypt/cryptsetup No Yes[22] Yes No No Yes
FreeOTFE Yes No No Yes[23] Yes No
dm-crypt/LUKS No Yes[22] Yes Yes Yes Yes
GELI No Yes[20] Yes Yes[24] Yes[24] Yes[20]
CryptArchiver No No No No ? No
n-Crypt Pro No No No No N/A[25] No
Scramdisk Yes No No No ? No
SecuBox No No No No ? No

[edit] Layering

For more details on this topic, see Encryption layer in storage stack.
  • Whole disk: Whether the whole disk can be encrypted, including the partition tables. Note that this does not imply that the encrypted disk can be booted off of; refer to "pre-boot authentication" in the features comparison table.
  • Partition: Whether individual disk partitions can be encrypted.
  • File: Whether the encrypted container can be stored in a file (usually implemented as encrypted loop devices).
  • Swap space: Whether the swap space (called a "pagefile" on Windows) can be encrypted individually/explicitly.
Name Whole disk Partition File Swap space
BestCrypt Yes No Yes Yes
Sentry 2020 No No Yes No
PGPDisk Yes Yes Yes No
CrossCrypt No No Yes No
DriveCrypt No Yes[17] Yes[17] No
CGD Yes Yes Yes[18] Yes
GBDE Yes Yes ? Yes
cryptoloop Yes Yes Yes Yes
TrueCrypt Yes[26] Yes[26] Yes[26] Add-on[27]
dm-crypt Yes Yes Yes[28] Yes
FreeOTFE Yes Yes Yes No
GELI Yes Yes ? Yes
CryptArchiver No No Yes No
n-Crypt Pro Yes Yes Yes No
Scramdisk No Yes Yes No
SecuBox No No Yes N/A

[edit] Modes of operation

For more details on this topic, see Disk encryption theory.

Different modes of operation supported by the software. Note that an encrypted volume can only use one mode of operation.

  • CBC w/ public IVs: The CBC (cipher block chaining) mode where initialization vectors are statically derived from the sector number and and are not secret; this means that IVs are re-used when overwriting a sector and the vectors can easily be guessed by an attacker, leading to watermarking attacks.
  • CBC w/ secret IVs: The CBC mode where initialization vectors are statically derived from the encryption key and sector number. The IVs are secret, but they are re-used with overwrites. Methods for this include ESSIV and encrypted sector numbers (CGD).
  • LRW: The Liskov-Rivest-Wagner tweakable narrow-block mode, a mode of operation specifically designed for disk encryption.
  • Random per-sector keys: The CBC mode where random keys are generated for each sector when it is written to, thus does not exhibit the typical weaknesses of CBC with re-used initialization vectors. The individual sector keys are stored on disk and encrypted with a master key. (See GBDE for details)
Name CBC w/ public IVs CBC w/ secret IVs LRW Random per-sector keys
BestCrypt ? ? Yes[29] No
Sentry 2020 ? ? ? ?
PGPDisk ? ? ? ?
CrossCrypt Yes No No No
DriveCrypt ? ? ? ?
CGD No Yes[30] No No
GBDE No No No Yes[21]
cryptoloop Yes No No No
TrueCrypt Terminated in 4.1[31] No Yes[32] No
dm-crypt Yes Yes Yes[33] No
FreeOTFE Yes Yes No No
GELI No Yes[34] No No
CryptArchiver ? ? ? ?
n-Crypt Pro ? ? No No
Scramdisk ? ? ? ?
SecuBox ? ? ? ?

[edit] See also

[edit] Notes and references

  1. ^ Jetico Company Info. Jetico. Retrieved on January 5, 2007.
  2. ^ Sentry 2020 news. Retrieved on January 2, 2007.
  3. ^ "PGP 6.0 Freeware released - any int'l links?". comp.security.pgp. (Google Groups). Retrieved on 2007-01-04.
  4. ^ Stefan Scherrer (2004-02-03). readme.txt in CrossCrypt source distribution. Retrieved on January 5, 2007.
  5. ^ Roland Dowdeswell (2002-10-04). CryptoGraphic Disk. mailing list announcement. Retrieved on January 14, 2007.
  6. ^ gbde(4) man page in FreeBSD 4.11. GBDE manual page as it appeared in FreeBSD 4.11. Retrieved on December 24, 2006.
  7. ^ Initial cryptoloop patches for the Linux 2.5 development kernel: http://uwsg.iu.edu/hypermail/linux/kernel/0307.0/0348.html
  8. ^ TrueCrypt version history. Retrieved on December 24, 2006.
  9. ^ dm-crypt was first included in Linux kernel version 2.6.4: http://lwn.net/Articles/75404/
  10. ^ FreeOTFE version history. Retrieved on December 24, 2006.
  11. ^ Clemens Fruhwirth. LUKS version history. Retrieved on December 24, 2006.
  12. ^ geli(8) man page in FreeBSD 6.0. GELI manual page as it first appeared in FreeBSD 6.0. Retrieved on December 24, 2006.
  13. ^ Secubox for Pocket PC. release announcement. Aiko Solutions. Retrieved on May 22, 2007.
  14. ^ Supported by the BestCrypt container format; see BestCrypt SDK
  15. ^ PGP Whole Disk Encryption FAQ. PGP Corporation. Retrieved on December 24, 2006.
  16. ^ PGP private keys are always protected by strengthened passphrases
  17. ^ a b c DriveCrypt features. SecurStar GmbH. Retrieved on January 3, 2007.
  18. ^ a b c Roland C. Dowdeswell, John Ioannidis. "The CryptoGraphic Disk Driver" (PDF). Retrieved on 2006-12-24.
  19. ^ Federico Biancuzzi (2005-12-21). Inside NetBSD's CGD. interview with Roland Dowdeswell. ONLamp.com.
  20. ^ a b c d FreeBSD Handbook: Encrypting Disk Partitions. Retrieved on December 24, 2006.
  21. ^ a b c Poul-Henning Kamp. "GBDE - GEOM Based Disk Encryption" (PDF). Retrieved on 2006-12-24.
  22. ^ a b c dm-crypt and cryptoloop volumes can be mounted from the initrd before the system is booted
  23. ^ FreeOTFE allows multiple keys to mount the same container file via encrypted keyfiles
  24. ^ a b geli(8) man page in FreeBSD-current. GELI manual page in current FreeBSD. Retrieved on December 24, 2006.
  25. ^ n-Crypt Pro does not use password authentication — biometric/USB dongle authentication only
  26. ^ a b c TrueCrypt documentation: TrueCrypt Volume. Retrieved on January 8, 2007.
  27. ^ Third-Party Project: TCTEMP. Retrieved on January 8, 2007. "TCTEMP automates the process of using TrueCrypt to on-the-fly encrypt the Windows paging (swap) file, temporary files, and print spooler files."
  28. ^ dm-crypt can encrypt a file-based volume when used with the losetup utility included with all major Linux distributions
  29. ^ New features in BestCrypt version 8. Jetico. Retrieved on March 2, 2007.
  30. ^ man 4 cgd in NetBSD-current. NetBSD current manual page on CGD (2006-03-11). Retrieved on December 24, 2006.
  31. ^ See released source code; just uses sector number in earlier versions
  32. ^ New containers created with TrueCrypt versions 4.1 and up use LRW, old containers use plain CBC
  33. ^ Starting with Linux kernel version 2.6.20, CryptoAPI supports the LRW mode: http://lwn.net/Articles/213650/
  34. ^ Linux/BSD disk encryption comparison. Retrieved on December 24, 2006.
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