[Discuss] Full disk encryption and backups

[Richard Pieri]

On 1/3/2012 10:32 PM, Tom Metro wrote:
> Ummm...yeah. You do realize that in order to use your data you need to
> decrypt it, right? :-)

Yeah, but that data remains local within hopefully protected memory 
areas.  Bacukps usually run to external storage of some sort, be they 
flash drives or NAS or what have you.  Take the Firewire or USB link 
bewteen a Macintosh and its Time Machine disk.  This link is completely 
unauthenticated and unsecured.  An attacker could tap that connection 
without any difficulty.

There are ways to deal with this but they add complexity to the backup 
system.  The more complex you make the backup system, the more difficult 
you make it to use.

-- 
Rich P.