How do I encrypt my home partition?

Question

With Ubuntu 9.10 I did not have any encrypted partitions set up, I have since installed a fresh Ubuntu 10.04.

I have 3 partitions: OS root (/), home and swap. How do I enable encryption on my existing /home partition?

Answer 1

Ubuntu Help: Encrypted Home points to this article here: Migrating to an Encrypted Home Directory which was written about a year ago. Though this article actually appears to still be valid in how to approach this.

You won't be encrypting the entire /home partition but rather each individual home folder. In future user setups you can pass the --encrypt-home flag on the useradd command. (adduser --encrypt-home new-user-name)