We do all have some private stuff on our harddisks. Whether applications, business plans, private letters or just some calculations - there is much stuff I do not want to see in the hands of others, especially not hackers or officials.
I did not care about that for years, as Millions of people do, until I took a look at TrueCrypt. TrueCrypt is an open source encryption software which is available for most operating systems, including Windows, Linux and OS X.
It offers you various possibilities to protect (and hide) your private data, including encrypting complete devices as USB sticks or creating "virtual hard disks", hidden in files. I've choosen the second option because I can simply backup my data this way and don't have to care about loosing data by a damaged USB stick or hard disk.
Using it is quite simple today - just follow the assistant in the software, create your protected volume and start using it by mounting it. Sounds complicated? No, it isn't. To mount a volume you just have to select the container file, put in your private password and click the "Mount" button - and the volume will appear immediately on your computer.
Of course - by encryption the data transfer rate is low, but it's enough for storing and opening documents, photos and other "small" stuff.
Give it a try.
