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My laptop has been stolen and it contained highly sensitive data. I did have a password that was required to login, but I am unsure if my data is safe. (at this point the data is more valuable than the laptop, so it's a big concern for me)

I remember Ubuntu having an option to encrypt the home folder on installation, but I don't remember if I picked it or not. What is the default (10.04) ? Also was there a way for me to tell during usage or is it completely transparent?

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2 Answers

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Under the default settings your home folder is not encrypted.

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I see. Is the encryption totally transparent? (ie: if I did encrypt it would I notice something different in day-to-day usage?) – NullUserException Oct 15 '10 at 1:06
@NullUserException No I don't think you would. – DoR Oct 15 '10 at 1:07
It's totally transparent unless you hit a bug, and they're pretty rare. – RAOF Oct 15 '10 at 4:31
up vote 1 down vote

You can see that it's in use from the output of the command mount (without any options) in a terminal; when your home is encrypted there should be a line there that says an "ecryptfs" is mounted on "/home/yourusername". Similarly, there should be an ecryptfs line with the df command.

Maybe not useful anymore now, unless you used those commands...

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