USBCrypt Overview

Thank you for choosing USBCrypt!

USBCrypt^™ is a software utility that you can use to encrypt USB and other removable and fixed drives with strong encryption:

When you encrypt a host disk (such as drive H:) with USBCrypt, it uses a portion of the host disk to create a Virtual Encrypted Disk with its own drive letter (such as drive E:). The drive E: becomes available only after you have entered a valid password. Any file you put onto the drive E: will be encrypted and decrypted on-the-fly, in the background, as necessary.

USBCrypt is the "on-the-fly" encryption software, that works by creating a Virtual Encrypted Disk on the host drive and protecting it with the password of your choosing. You decide how large the Virtual Encrypted Disk should be: it can take all of the available space of the host disk, or only a fraction of it. After you encrypt a drive with USBCrypt, you can enter your password to start the Virtual Encrypted Disk and use it just like any other real disk: you can browse it with Windows Explorer or any other software you have, copy files to it, or move them back to your main hard disk, save documents to the Virtual Encrypted disk and open them when needed, and so on. Any file that you move to the Virtual Encrypted Disk gets encrypted transparently, without you having to do anything special. When you open a document or move a file out of the Virtual Encrypted Disk, it gets decrypted automatically on the fly. When you no longer need to work with the private files, you can stop the Virtual Encrypted Disk and it will become locked with your password again.

USBCrypt puts its software on the encrypted drive, too, to make you able to use the removable drive on other computers, without USBCrypt installed on them. For example, if you've purchased USBCrypt for use in your office, you can take the encrypted USB drive home with you and use it on your home computer without installing the full copy of USBCrypt software on your home computer.

How strong is the encryption of USBCrypt?

USBCrypt uses the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) with the key strength of 128 or 256 bits. (Business customers have the option of using several other encryption algorithms, as well). This encryption is very strong: there is currently no realistic method that can break such encryption. Checking all possible keys would take a long, long time (longer than the age of the Universe). The only way to get access to the files protected with USBCrypt is to provide the correct password. This is the good news; the bad news is that if you forget your password, there would be no way to get your files back. To protect you from such an unpleasant situation, USBCrypt offers you an option to create a spare key file on your computer.

Is administrator access needed to use USBCrypt?

Just like with most other software, the administrator rights are required to install USBCrypt on a computer. The administrator rights are also necessary to create the Virtual Encrypted Disks. If you attach the encrypted drive to another computer that does not have USBCrypt software already installed on it, the administrative rights are needed to use the encrypted drive on such a computer. However, to use the encrypted drives on your own computer(s) where you have already installed USBCrypt software, the administrative rights are NOT required.

Can I encrypt non-USB drives?

Yes! While USBCrypt is designed primarily to encrypt the removable USB disks, it can encrypt other types of disks, as well, including FireWire and the local ones. The general rule is: if you can see the disk as a local or removable drive in the Computer folder, and you can create files on the disk, then you can use USBCrypt to encrypt such a disk.

Can I use the encrypted drive on another computer?

Yes, you can, even if that computer does not have USBCrypt software installed on it, as long as the computer is running a supported version of Windows. Note that you may need to get an administrator approval to use an encrypted drive on another computer.

Any other questions?

Please see the answers to the Frequently Asked Questions.