这是个机器人猖狂的时代，请输一下验证码，证明咱是正常人~This article presents the case for encrypting your entire system disk.
The number one reason, as the tutorial below illustrates, is that it’s incredibly easy, thanks to TrueCrypt. But the other reasons have a lot to do with identity theft and a little bit to do with covering your ass(ets) in the case of a federal investigation. If you’re already convinced, feel free to skip to the tutorial with the links below. Otherwise, read on.
Why Everyone Should Have an Encrypted System Disk
Okay, let me qualify this. Not everyone should encrypt their system disk. Just everyone who has personal or financial information on their computer, such as tax returns, stored passwords, browsing history, emails, resumes, address books, photos and videos, utility bills, account histories, etc. If all you use your computer for is reading Reddit in Incognito Mode, then you probably don’t need to encrypt your data. But if you are like the vast majority of personal or business computer users, you have valuable data that warrants protection. Here are the top three risks associated with having an unencrypted hard drive.
1. Thieves aren’t just after your hardware
A thief can probably make a few hundred bucks fencing a stolen laptop. But he can make even more money if he steals your identity while he’s at it. Whether it’s your Bitcoin wallet, an old tax return or a Google Chrome installation with your Amazon, PayPal and online banking passwords cached, the data on your hard drive could prove to be far more valuable than the hardware itself.
“Ah, but I have my Windows account password-protected. He won’t even be able to log on,” you say.
Sorry. Data/laptop thieves only need to be a little bit clever in order to bypass the Windows login screen and get at your data. At the bare minimum, all he’d need is a bootable installation of Linux on a thumbdrive and he could boot up your computer and explore the contents of your system drive in its entirety. This is because your Windows password protection only prevents someone from logging in to your Windows user account. It doesn’t stop them from accessing the data by another means anymore than an ignition key stops a carjacker from breaking your window and hotwiring your car. There are edge cases I know. Perhaps you encrypted your files and folders using Steve’s
however my guess is, that’s indeed the exception not the rule. Let’s move on.
2. For sale: your old hard drive (and all of your data)
Warranties are fantastic. I’ve had hard drives, power sources and entire computers replaced under warranty lickety split, free of charge, no hassle. But when it comes to hard drives, there’s
a catch. In order to get a repair or replacement, you have to mail your old hard drive in (RMA process). The same goes for sending in your entire computer for warranty repairs. Before doing this, it seems logical to securely erase any sensitive data from your hard drive, just like you would before selling or recycling your computer. But if your computer is bricked or your hard drive won’t even mount , then that’s not an option. You’re going to have to send in your hard drive with all of your data still intact.
This would be problematic if, say, there was an unscrupulous technician (perhaps a 3rd party subcontractor) harvesting customer data whilst performing warranty service. That’s probably rare however it . But what is far more common is the practice of reselling used drives. If you’ve been keeping an eye on the deal sites, you may have noticed “refurbished” hard drives for sale at a big discount. These refurbished or recertified hard drives are usually drives that have been returned or exchanged under warranty. Oftentimes, rather than making you wait while they evaluate and repair your hard drive, manufacturers will send you a brand new hard drive to cover your warranty. Then, they’ll take your drive, fix it up, reformat it and (maybe) securely wipe it before repacking it and selling it back to another customer. While most everyday users won’t even know to look for residual data on a used drive,
a determined data recovery guru or… even a bored kid could likely glean just enough data from a reformatted drive to do some damage using
available on the net. A Social Security number, after all, is only nine digits long – every time if you know what I mean.
If you are returning hardware, it’s a good idea to ask the vendor or manufacturer to destroy it after they’ve completed their evaluation. But as one gentleman returning a computer to Best Buy discovered, making the store follow through on its promises isn’t always easy. As chronicled by MSNBC blogger Bob Sullivan, a Cincinnati customer returned his broken computer to Best Buy, thinking his old hard drive would be drilled and disposed of in a secure manner. Much to his chagrin, he received a phone call six months later from a stranger who told him “” at a flea market in Chicago. Ouch….
3. Throwing out a hard drive? That could be a federal offense
FACTA, HIPAA and other federal privacy and identity theft prevention regulations require businesses to properly dispose of customer and patient records. Paper records—manila folders, medical charts, loan applications—are the first thing to come to mind. But digital records are also covered by federal law. If you’re a business, that puts you on the hook for properly disposing of your hard drives and other media. These days, most institutions go far beyond drilling holes through the platter and instead shred the drives into tiny chunks, or they outsource the job to a company who specializes in this providing certificates of destruction to prove the work was completed.
But if you’re not a business or hospital, there’s no need to worry, right? Not exactly. Let’s say you hire a babysitter or a nanny. As part of your due diligence, you order a background check on her and save the results—including her address history, her SSN, etc.—onto the hard drive of an old computer. Years later, you donate the old computer to Goodwill, some college kid buys it, does a
and bam — has way more information about your nanny than he legally should. As your nanny’s employer, you’ve failed in your federally-mandated duty to protect her identity.
System Disk Encryption to the Rescue
The real liability in all of these situations is letting sensitive or confidential information reside unencrypted on a hard drive. Data is notoriously difficult to eradicate. This is especially true when we’re talking about solid-state drives (SSDs) and flash-based media (like SD cards); one study found that it is . That’s why encryption is such a graceful solution. With encrypted data, it doesn’t matter nearly as much if your data falls into the wrong hands. Unless they can crack the encryption or guess your password, they aren’t going to get any usable personal information from your disk.
If a data thief mounts your disk to another system, all they will find is encrypted gibberish.
Combine encryption with a secure format (when possible), and you are all but invulnerable to data theft.
System disk encryption is convenient because it doesn’t disrupt your normal computer usage, except for an extra password to enter at boot up and a slight drop in performance.
deemed the performance impact “not noticeable” to average users.
System disk encryption protects every bit of data on your hard drive without requiring you to pick and choose which documents and files to encrypt. And best of all, you can do it for free using TrueCrypt. Here’s how:
Encrypt Your Entire System Disk Using TrueCrypt
Download and install
on the Windows machine that you want to encrypt (this tutorial uses TrueCrypt 7.1a).
Then, launch TrueCrypt and click System | Encrypt System Partition/Drive…
Next, select the type of system encryption. I recommend choosing Normal for now. Hidden is probably a bit overkill (read the description in the screenshot to learn about its intent). Click Next.
In the Area to Encrypt window, you have two options. If you have your data and your Windows installation on the same partition, then choose the first option (“Encrypt the Windows system partition”). If you have multiple partitions—e.g. one for your data and one for your operating system—then choose the second option (“Encrypt the whole drive”). If you are unsure, go with the second one. Click Next.
In the next screen, choose Single-boot or Multi-boot and click Next.
Next, choose your encryption options. If you don’t know what any of this means, then the default settings are good enough for you. Note that you do have the option to use multiple levels of encryption. While this is more secure, it does increase the performance impact (that is, your computer will run slightly slower than if you chose a single level of encryption). Click Next.
Choose a password. As always, longer passwords are stronger. But make sure it’s one you can remember. Click Next.
Move your mouse cursor to randomize the pool content. Click Next.
View your master and header keys. You don’t have to write this down or anything. This is just FYI. Click Next.
TrueCrypt will now prompt you to burn a TrueCrypt Rescue Disk. Do not skip this step. TrueCrypt uses a special boot loader to decrypt your drive. If your system becomes damaged or corrupted, then you will need this disk in order to access your data. So don’t lose it. Note also that the TrueCrypt Recovery Disk is specific to your encrypted system disk. You can’t use a rescue disk that you created for another encrypted disk. Click Next to start the process.
If you don’t have an CD/DVD drive on your computer, you can also create the TrueCrypt Recovery Disk on a USB drive.
If you have a burner on your computer, you’ll be taken directly to the Windows Disc Image Burner utility and you won’t see the prompt below.
After burning your TrueCrypt Rescue Disk, you’ll be asked if you want to choose a secure wipe mode. Again, this is for the ultraparanoid. You can probably skip this step and be okay. But if you have a very large drive that you’ve been using for awhile, it won’t hurt to wipe the drive before encrypting it. The only thing you have to lose is time. But if you aren’t worried about someone using magnetic force microscopy to recover your overwritten data, choose None (fastest) and click Next.
TrueCrypt will now run a system encryption pretest. This entails a reboot and a prompt for your new password. This ensures that the TrueCrypt Boot Loader was installed correctly and that everything works fine before your drive is encrypted. Click Test when you are ready. You’ll still have an opportunity to back out if the test doesn’t go well.
After clicking Test, you’ll be prompted to reboot. Upon doing so, you’ll see your normal BIOS screen followed by the TrueCrypt Boot Loader. Enter your password to finish booting into Windows.
After a successful pretest, you can click Encrypt to finish the job.
Depending on the size of the volume and the speed of your computer, this could take awhile. On my Core i5 laptop, it took about five hours to encrypt my 250 GB system disk
(I let it run overnight). On my AMD Phenom II X4 2.8 Ghz desktop, it estimated 18 hours to encrypt my 1.5 TB hard drive. Your mileage will vary.
Fortunately, you can defer or pause the encryption process at any time. You can even restart or shut down your computer and resume the encryption process where you left off. TrueCrypt will run the encryption process in the background while you use other applications, but this will lengthen the overall time it takes to encrypt.
When the encryption is complete, your Windows system will look and feel exactly the same as it did. The only difference is that you’ll see the TrueCrypt Boot Loader screen every time you power on your computer or wake it from hibernation. You won’t have to enter your pre-boot authentication password after waking from sleep.
Undoing an Entire System Disk Encryption
If you’re tired of punching in an additional password or if you want to permanently decrypt your system disk for some other reason, you can undo your TrueCrypt system disk encryption by clicking System & Permanently Decrypt System Partition/Drive.
You’ll be given due warning that your drive will be unencrypted afterward. After clicking Yes the requisite number of times, the decryption process will begin. Settle in—this will take nearly as long as it took to encrypt the drive in the first place. Again, you can use your computer and/or pause or defer the decryption at any time.
After the decryption is complete, you’ll be asked to reboot. The TrueCrypt Boot Loader screen won’t appear anymore and your system disk will be unencrypted.
Note that even though you won’t be prompted to enter your password, the TrueCrypt Boot Loader will still be installed on your system disk. This shouldn’t present any problems. But if it bugs you knowing that there is residual stuff leftover on your master boot record, you can rewrite your MBR using a Windows 7 Installation disc or a .
Conclusion
Encrypting your system disk with TrueCrypt is free, secure and easy. There’s relatively little overhead in terms of performance impact and added inconvenience. But the benefits to your data security are immense. In this way, system disk encryption is a lot like home insurance. Hopefully, you’ll never have to use it. But when the unthinkable happens, you’ll be glad as hell that it’s there.
About Jack Busch
Based in Pittsburgh,
is a groovyPost senior editor and professional technical writer. News or geek tip? Drop Jack an email at
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Parenting Advice You Really Should and Shouldn’t Follow
yuanli00 于发布 l 已有人浏览
父母指南教会你哪些该做哪些不该做！如何教好孩子，让孩子健康成长。
Parenting Advice You Really Should and Shouldn&t Follow
There was a time, not so long ago, when bottle feeding your baby and letting them &cry it out& was practically a patriotic duty. Then came self-esteem building, attachment parenting and a strong movement back towards breastfeeding. Add to that the great body of parenting folklore culled from across the ages (didn&t you know that giving them bread crusts to eat will make their hair curly, while carrots will improve their vision?), and it can be incredibly difficult as a new parent to tell whether you&re turning your kids into superheroes or single-handedly ruining their lives. More recently, the rise of parenting advice blogs has led to the development of some supportive communities for sorting out all of these conflicting ideas (and, well, just for venting about what a day with kids is like), while others have served only to increase each parent&s access to a wellspring of unsolicited opinions and judgmental biases. So, just what advice should you follow and what should you leave by the wayside? We&ve taken a look at all of the data and accompanying anecdotes for a sense of what works and what doesn&t.
20 Things 20-Somethings Need To Stop Doing Now
1. When in Doubt, Ask for Cash&Ermh& &Savings&
Do it! Here&s a fact about little ones: they&re far more interested in the wrapping paper and box than they are in the actual present they contain. Obvious, right? Then why do we still feel that when friends and family ask what they should get the kids for their birthdays/the holidays/just because, we have to rack our brains for a gift they&re going to outgrow either physically or mentally in a matter of months? Cold, hard cash would obviously be far more useful to receive when the kids are young, as you&d be able to just go out and buy the things you know they need. But since cash is still a taboo thing to ask for, asking for something like savings bonds is a much better way to go, as they&ll grow right along with your little tyke. Is there really a better gift, after all, then sending your kid off to college with spending money or even without student debt? That&s a possibility when you go this route. Granted, once your child is past a certain age and has more of a will of their own, savings bonds are about as interesting as socks, so this tip may have a shelf life.
2. Joke Around
Do it! As parents, it&s easy to get caught up in the day-to-day tasks of family life, whether that&s sneaking in a load of laundry in the precious 15 minutes they actually nap or disciplining unacceptable behavior. But, you know, laughing matters too. In fact, taking the time to joke and play with your child will not only help you both relax and enjoy your relationship a bit more, but it will also help teach your child how to handle life&s stresses and navigate social situations. Additionally, as a parent, it&s important to make peace with the fact that you&re just not going to win every battle, and that if you try to, you&ll probably meet an early grave. While you want to be consistent, of course, don&t forget to jar yourself every now again, let go and smile.
3. Praise Your Kids. A Lot. For Everything.
Don&t do it! For years, child development experts heavily promoted self-esteem-building parenting based on lavishing praise for just about everything. When you hear people complain about how everyone at the t-ball championships gets a trophy whether or not they win, this is exactly what they&re referring to. Turns out, constant praise actually lowers self-esteem. Why? It makes it impossible for the child to sort out what praise is coming from simply existing and what is stemming from actual hard work and achievement. Put another way, it puts too much of an emphasis on being great &just the way you are,& and not enough emphasis on working to achieve a goal. Accordingly, when an overly praised child encounters anything remotely challenging & which pretty much summarizes all of learning & they&re far more likely to give up than to push through. In the long term, this leads to a lack of self-discipline and achievement, and yes, lowered self-esteem. However, that&s not to say we need to return to the kind of boarding school atmosphere you&d encounter in a Roald Dahl book. Instead, just save your praise for moments when your child truly does something amazing. Every other time, provide warm, positive feedback focused more on the work they&re putting in than their intrinsic ability. That means saying something like, &You&re doing a great job learning piano and I know if you keep on working hard you&re going to really excel,& rather than, &Wow, you&re so talented at piano!& Not only will this inspire your child to keep at it with discipline and hard work, but it also means that should they &fail& anywhere down the line, they&ll take it as a matter of needing to continue working hard, rather than some intrinsic lack of ability.
4. Create a Bedtime Routine as Early as Possible
Do it! Yes, yes, I know, setting a bedtime routine is easier said than done, but doing so will make your whole family happier, child included. It will also give your child an initial sense of structure and routine, which will make transitions into school and preschool easier further down the line. And if you incorporate reading into the routine as well, you&ll be killing two birds with one stone, setting them up for a lifetime of literacy and learning.
5. Clean. Everything. All the Time.
Don&t do it! I mean sure, clean, but chill out a bit about it. Yes, the world is a filthy, germ-ridden place, but in fact many common health tips are actually old wives& tales. Plus, your kid won&t build up an immune system without some exposure, and if you&re using harsh chemicals to clean, you&re doing more damage than good & especially if you&re relying heavily on cleaners with any kind of antibiotic, as this can increase and spread antibiotic resistance. Of course, this isn&t a call to send your kids to the ICU just for funsies. Hygiene is still a must, but relax knowing that hand washing, vaccination, and keeping high-germ areas like the kitchen and the bathroom cleaner than others will pretty much have you covered.
6. Don&t compare yourself to other parents
Do it! Ermh, meaning, take this advice and stop comparing yourself to other parents. Why? Because many different parenting approaches work, and it&s better to find what works for you and your family than to worry too much about what everyone else is doing. Not only will this drive you crazy and set you up for failure, but you&ll also do a poor job of implementing someone else&s technique when it doesn&t feel like you. &Yes, eat all of those Brussels sprouts, or else you&ll& die or something&& Other parents can be good for exchanging horror stories and some manner of tips, but this can also easily turn into feeling bad about your supposed &failures.& What&s more, not only are you an individual with your individual parenting style, but your kid is an individual too, and they&re bound to develop at their own rate and in their own way. Unless it&s an important milestone, like talking before the age of, say, five, just go with your gut, trust your instincts, and try not to get too caught up in what other people have to say.
7. Take Time for Yourself (and Go Easy on Yourself!)
Do it! To piggyback on the above, it&s important to embrace the idea that you&re not always going to be the &perfect parent.& The more you can laugh about it, the lower your blood pressure will be, and the more your kids will benefit. The same goes for taking time out to indulge yourself, whether that means heading to the spa for a massage or taking 10 minutes to enjoy your morning coffee before waking the kids up. If you&re trying to be a superparent, you probably feel you need to be on all the time, but you&ll be more refreshed and ready to embrace the kid-filled day if you&re taking at least some care of your own needs. And hey, the older the tykes get, the more they can thrive without you anyway. Isn&t that what they call independence?
The Takeaway
Doling out parenting advice is an international pastime. While there&s much to learn, there&s also much to reject. As the person who lives with your kids day in and day out, you&ve got the best sense of what&s working and what&s not. While you certainly want to be open to feedback, especially from professionals like teachers and psychologists, don&t let an internet word of advice weigh you down. Have fun with it, and do you like you do, you parenting rock star, you!
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