Lesson 2: USB Disk Encryption

Instructions on USB Disk encryption, secure Flash drive, data encryption

Now it’s time to pull out your new, high quality USB drive!

If you haven’t got one yet, pause this module and grab yourself one. Don’t keep going without completing this step, as it’s crucial for safeguarding your private access information.

Select the specific operating system you are working with, as this process differs slightly from from Windows, to Mac, to Linux.

Encrypt A Flash Drive on a Mac

Step 1: Insert your flash drive into your USB port. Remove any files you wish to keep to your HD (you can copy them back later).

Step 2: Once the flash drive is empty, open Terminal, which is found under Applications.

Step 3: Type diskutil list to show all devices currently connected. One of the entries should look similar to this:

/dev/disk7 (external, physical): 
#:    TYPE NAME    SIZE       IDENTIFIER    
0:    Fdisk_partition_scheme        *1.0 GB     disk7        
1:    Apple_HFS LOGBOOK        1.0 GB     disk7s1        

with the name of your USB stick instead of LOGBOOK. Take note of the device shown in the first line (eg: /dev/disk7).

Note: You need to be SUPER vigilant here because you don’t want to erase your Mac Hard Drive!!

Step 4: Type into Terminal

diskutil eraseDisk JHFS+ NEWNAME GPT /dev/diskWHATEVER-NUMBER-YOURS-IS 

to erase all content and create the required partition scheme. Be sure to replace “NEWNAME” with whatever you want to name your disk (you need to enclose the name in "" if your name contains anything other than letters) and use the device number you found above (NOT THE NUMBER OF YOUR MAC HARD DRIVE!).

Step 5: Encrypt the USB stick in Finder by right-clicking on the stick name in the sidebar.

Encrypt A Flash Drive In Windows

Windows 7 and newer versions have an internal feature called BitLocker which is used to encrypt internal and external drives. Unfortunately, password protection is not available as a built-in feature in Windows XP, 7, 8 or even in 10. But there are third-party tools available for password protection.

In this section we’ll show you how to encrypt a flash USB drive in Windows, using BitLocker.

Step 1: Plug in the USB drive and remove any data from it.

Step 2: Right click your flash drive and select Format... Use NTFS Format.

Step 3: Right click your flash drive and select Turn On BitLocker.

Step 4: Select the first option, that enables the password fields. Enter your desired password and click Next.

Step 5: Save your “private key” in a safe location and click Next. It will take a little time to process, depending on your flash drive storage as well as your PC performance. Usually It takes about 1 minute per 1 GB.

Step 6: Once processing is done, unplug the flash drive and plug it in again,. You will see the dialog box asking for the password.

Now your folder or drive is completely encrypted.

Encrypt A Flash Drive In Ubuntu Or Linux Operating System

As with other operating systems, there are encryption tools available which are perfectly compatible with both Linux & Ubuntu.

In this Tutorial we will use Disk Utility.

Step 1: Plug in your USB flash drive and remove your data.

Step 2: Go to the dashboard Home and type Disk Utility.

Step 3: Find your flash drive and click it.

Step 4: Click Unmount the Volume so you can format the disk before encryption.

Step 5: Click Format Drive.

Step 6: Select Encrypt full disk or create a partition of encrypted storage.

Step 7: Select Encrypt underlying device and create the drive.

Step 8: Select Create New Password for your encrypted folder and click Create.

Step 9: Disconnect your USB. When you reconnect it you will see a dialog box asking for the password.

Now your folder or drive is completely encrypted.