[Mageia-dev] unable to mount encrypted partitions created with drakdisk

[David W. Hodgins]

On Tue, 20 Mar 2012 20:57:47 -0400, simple w8 <simplew8 at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi,
>
> I use sometimes to boo Windows, and if i need some file i use to mount
> my /home encrypted partition using FreeOTFE (or TrueCrypt) to access
> the files i need, but i saw today that the /home partition that was
> created in mageia is not possible to mount with FreeOTFE or TrueCrypt.
>
> But the /home partition created with mandriva drakdisk can be mounted
> with those 2 applications, so seams that Mageia drakdisk isnt doing
> something right.

That's likely a result of
https://bugs.mageia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=3092

With the default settings, cryptsetup uses cbc mode encryption,
which makes it much more likely that it can be cracked.

See http://clemens.endorphin.org/nmihde/nmihde-A4-os.pdf
for an explanation of how this is done.

In Mageia's diskdrake, the setting is overridden to use xts mode,
instead of cbc mode.

If you prefer to use the less secure method, in order
to keep it compatible with the windows applications, you'll
have to re-encrypt it manually with
cryptsetup luksFormat /dev/sd??.

Don't forget to backup the data first, as this will erase that
device.

Regards, Dave Hodgins