The importance of security should never be underestimated. The consequences of losing data can be disastrous for any organization. For example, the loss of a single unencrypted laptop may have huge repercussions. This could include breaching data protection legislation with the risk of a significant fine, a loss in the confidence of an organization, as well as the risk that sensitive data may fall into the hands of a competitor or third party with malicious intent.
Disk encryption is one method to help minimize the risks by preventing unauthorized access to data storage, to ensure safe information exchanges, safeguard against data leakage, and manage compliance. This form of security is useful for any computer that holds personal information, not only laptops. Disk encryption uses disk encryption software to encrypt the entire hard disk. The onus is therefore not on the user to determine what data should be encrypted, or to remember to manually encrypt files. By encrypting the entire disk, temporary files, which may reveal important confidential data, are also protected. Security is enhanced further when disk encryption is combined with filesystem-level encryption.
Filesystem in Userspace (FUSE) is a software interface for Unix and Unix-like computer operating systems that lets non-privileged users create their own file systems without editing kernel code. This is achieved by running file system code in user space while the FUSE module provides only a “bridge” to the actual kernel interfaces.
Here’s our verdict on the popular encrypted FUSE-based file systems.
Let’s explore the 5 encrypted FUSE-based file systems. For each program we have compiled its own portal page, a full description with an in-depth analysis of its features, together with links to relevant resources.
| Encrypted FUSE-based file systems | |
|---|---|
| gocryptfs | Encrypted overlay filesystem written in Go |
| Cryptomator | Multi-platform transparent client-side encryption of files in the cloud |
| CryFS | Cryptographic filesystem for the cloud |
| EncFS | Encrypted filesystem in user-space |
| securefs | Authenticated and probabilistic encryption with efficient cloud synchronization |
 Read our complete collection of recommended free and open source software. Our curated compilation covers all categories of software. The software collection forms part of our series of informative articles for Linux enthusiasts. There are hundreds of in-depth reviews, open source alternatives to proprietary software from large corporations like Google, Microsoft, Apple, Adobe, IBM, Cisco, Oracle, and Autodesk. There are also fun things to try, hardware, free programming books and tutorials, and much more. |