Re: file shredding tools

["Kent Borg" <user=107@nabble.blu.org>]

 Ben Holland wrote: 
> If someone gets hold of a disk and it's AES encrypted, they won't be 
> able to break it any time soon. 

Assuming a good key, yes. 

> Why would refusing to open the encrypted file be any different then 
> refusing to vpn in? ~Ben 

It is a legal and political difference. 

Customs thinks they can look at whatever passes physically before them.   
They think they can ask you to unlock your suitcase.  They think they 
can ask you to decrypt your files.  If you say "no", they can make your 
life difficult. 

But, even in this strange day-and-age, where search warrants aren't 
needed and torture is acceptable, there seems to be a reluctance to 
force one to cyber-burglarize ones own employer as a condition to 
returning to the country. 

Major corporation IT departments are doing the VPN route over the 
encrypted route.  They see a difference. 


Now, admittedly I am messing with the boundaries here.  One might 
consider the "key" to be every 16th byte.  But if one treated a whole 
120GB drive this way the "key" would still be a 7.5 GB file.  I imagine 
that as a practical matter the mangling of data could be less than 
1-in-16.  Maybe 1-in-32 or 1-in-64?, but the missing data would still be 
substantial (4 or 2 GB). 


-kb 

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