HOWTO: Encrypted directory with EncFS

**phrawzty** · March 9th, 2008

EDIT: Problem solved, see this thread :
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=719486

Hello,

While following this tutorial on a reasonably fresh 7.10 system, i received the following error during the initial creation of an encrypted directory :

Code:

fuse: device not found, try 'modprobe fuse' first
fuse failed.  Common problems:
 - fuse kernel module not installed (modprobe fuse)
 - invalid options -- see usage message

I assume the device, in this instance, is /dev/fuse ; however...

Code:

$ ls -l /dev/fuse
ls: /dev/fuse: No such file or directory

Modprobe should create this device, unfortunately...

Code:

$ sudo modprobe fuse
FATAL: Module fuse not found.
FATAL: Error running install command for fuse

Both fuse-utils and libfuse2 are installed :

Code:

$ dpkg -l | grep fuse
ii  fuse-utils                     2.7.0-1ubuntu5                  Filesystem in USErspace (utilities)
ii  libfuse2                       2.7.0-1ubuntu5                  Filesystem in USErspace library

In case the kernel version is relevant :

Code:

$ cat /etc/issue && uname -a
Ubuntu 7.10 \n \l

Linux sd-11222 2.6.23.10dedibox-r7 #1 Fri Dec 28 00:38:02 CET 2007 i686 GNU/Linux

I'm more than happy to accept any and all ideas on what the problem might be.

**Johnnny** · April 16th, 2008

I skimmed through some reviews and read the description of EncFS and somehow this feels the same as Truecrypt except that in Truecrypt you don't see the actual files encrypted in code. But sounds interesting enough I'll look more into it.

Thanks for the tutorial.

**Ziggy72** · April 18th, 2008

I haven't read through all of this thread, but when I installed encfs, all I did was:

Code:

sudo aptitude install encfs
sudo echo “fuse” >> /etc/modules
sudo modprobe fuse
sudo addgroup <your username> fuse

Then, using synaptic I installed cryptkeeper. Cryptkeeper looks after making, locating and opening encrypted folders. I find cryptkeeper to be an excellent little program.

**Zeroedout** · April 19th, 2008

Originally Posted by phrawzty

EDIT: Problem solved, see this thread :
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=719486

Hello,

While following this tutorial on a reasonably fresh 7.10 system, i received the following error during the initial creation of an encrypted directory :

Code:

fuse: device not found, try 'modprobe fuse' first
fuse failed.  Common problems:
 - fuse kernel module not installed (modprobe fuse)
 - invalid options -- see usage message

I assume the device, in this instance, is /dev/fuse ; however...

Code:

$ ls -l /dev/fuse
ls: /dev/fuse: No such file or directory

Modprobe should create this device, unfortunately...

Code:

$ sudo modprobe fuse
FATAL: Module fuse not found.
FATAL: Error running install command for fuse

Both fuse-utils and libfuse2 are installed :

Code:

$ dpkg -l | grep fuse
ii  fuse-utils                     2.7.0-1ubuntu5                  Filesystem in USErspace (utilities)
ii  libfuse2                       2.7.0-1ubuntu5                  Filesystem in USErspace library

In case the kernel version is relevant :

Code:

$ cat /etc/issue && uname -a
Ubuntu 7.10 \n \l

Linux sd-11222 2.6.23.10dedibox-r7 #1 Fri Dec 28 00:38:02 CET 2007 i686 GNU/Linux

I'm more than happy to accept any and all ideas on what the problem might be.

okay, I had your exact same problem just now. All I had to do was restart the system. I'm guessing it just needed to make use of the fact that I added my user to the fuse group.

**clfh** · August 12th, 2008

Have I hit a limitation in extfs that I had not understood?

What I want to do is encrypt a directory containing sensitive database files which are accessed and modified by an applet in a web server (which is remote and which I manage by using ssh). This means the web service is running in a daemon thread, not in a currently-logged-in ssh session.

It appears that extfs creates a session-specific binding between encrypted and decrypted directories. Certainly, if I run extfs from within a first ssh session, then close ssh (without running fusermount -u ), then connect again using ssh I can no longer access my data: the plain text directory is visible to 'ls' but with rubbish time, size etc. Its contents are inaccessible, and I cannot delete it or otherwise access it.

I shall need to access the plan-text data from the long-lived web server daemon and from transient ssh sessions (for backup purposes). Unless I've misunderstood something or have finger-trouble, I seems I cannot do this with extfs.

Have I misunderstood something, or missed some feature?

**boast** · August 17th, 2008

every time it comes to umounting it after use, it tells me the device is busy.

how can fusermount force umount or how can I tell what program could still be accessing the folder?

nm. its fuser -m folder

**gacb** · August 18th, 2010

Originally Posted by bluntu

Have anyone here tried TrueCrypt yet? How is it like?

My eyes glazed over when I was reading the Truecrypt instructions for the 5th time before trying it.

I'm a musician by training and hence a graphic type. Cryptkeeper is more my speed.

One question - other than creating a new unencrypted folder and copying the files, how does one decrypt a folder?

**Saeen** · May 12th, 2011

Hi,
When i run this script from shell

Code:

#!/bin/sh

cd `dirname $0`
HOME=`pwd` firefox

I get these errors:

Code:

6409): GnomeUI-WARNING **: While connecting to session manager:
None of the authentication protocols specified are supported.

(<unknown>:6455): Gdk-CRITICAL **: gdk_drawable_get_display: assertion `GDK_IS_DRAWABLE (drawable)' failed

Any Idea ?