Question

6

Password protect files/folders using cli

rated 0 times [ 6] [ 0] / answers: 1 / hits: 7363 / 1 Year ago, fri, november 25, 2022, 9:41:41

I have some important documents that I need to protect from anyone else having access to my machine.

The problem being the other persons have access to my machine via root account so changing the file permissions is not a option for me. I have seen apps like cryptkeeper but I was wondering can I password protect my files/folder by command line mode in ubuntu.

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hentor

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1 Year ago

answered 1 Year ago urnaetted · Accepted Answer

If other users have root access to the system, then the only way that I can see to protect your files/folders is encryption and decryption.

Lot of answers are listed here (in AskUbuntu) about encrypt/decrypt , but I will show the simplest method, in my opinion.

OpenSSL

Encrypt/Decrypt file

openssl aes-256-cbc -in file -out file.aes

openssl aes-256-cbc -d -in file.aes -out file

OpenSSL & Tar

Encrypt/Decrypt Folder

tar -zcf - directory | openssl aes-256-cbc -out directory.tar.gz.aes

openssl aes-256-cbc -d  -in directory.tar.gz.aes | tar -xz -f -

Keep your decryption password out of the sight, and out of the System.