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In May 2014, the developers of TrueCrypt dramatically pulled down the shutter for it, and it left everyone shocked. However, with the discontinuance of this tool, the need for hard drive encryption doesnt end. That means, if not this software, then some other hard drive encryption software is essential for encrypting the hard drive data. So, if you are looking for an alternative to TrueCrypt, then this article can help you out.
The Tool was receiving a good response from its users. In that light, the sudden stop in the development of this software is not a clear move on the developers end. The reason can be anything or perhaps the developers simply dont want to carry on the softwares maintenance anymore.
For a long time, this hard drive encryption software has helped thousands of users in achieving the desired protection for the data stored in their systems hard disk. As TrueCrypt's developers have officially stopped the development of the software. Also, they are not releasing any updates. Therefore, TrueCrypt security is no more assured. Therefore, its better for users to look for alternative options.
VeraCrypt
VeraCrypt is the latest hard disk encryption software that is receiving high popularity. The developers of VeraCrypt claim that this hard drive encryption tool doesnt have any of the potential buffer overflows, memory leaks and other serious security issues of TrueCrypt.
These two hard disk encryption tools use the same codes still VeraCrypt cant open the container files of TrueCrypt. Thus, if you wish to encrypt your data with VeraCrypt, then first you need to decrypt your data and then you have to re-encrypt it using VeraCrypt.
Also, VeraCrypt comes with additional protection features. For instance, it refuses to encrypt data if you are using a weak password. Also, you need to invest more time to get your data encrypted by VeraCrypt as the encrypting process is comparatively more time-consuming, and security enabled.
Operating Systems Built-in Encryption Tools
Considering the users demand for hard drive encryption tools, the majority of modern operating systems come with a built-in hard disk encryption facility. Thus, if you have yet not decided which alternative to TrueCrypt you will use, then you can start using your operating systems built-in encryption. Windows 7/8/8.1 comes with a very good encryption tool labeled BitLocker. The feature doesnt come enabled by default, so you need to get it enabled to avail the full-disk encryption. In the TrueCrypts official website, you can easily read the process of how to migrate your data from TrueCrypt to BitLocker. Windows XP doesnt support BitLoacker. However, that is not a very important aspect to consider as the Microsoft has stopped providing support for XP.
Mac OS X: Mac users can use the inbuilt encryption tool called FileVault disk. If your system has Mac OS X Yosemite, then FileVault disk gets automatically enabled whenever you set a new Mac up. However, you can choose to disable it or enable it as per your requirement. Using the System Preferences dialog, you can get FileVault enabled or disabled.
Linux: A Linux computer has a variety of encryption options. In fact, in most of the modern Linux OS, the disk encryption feature comes integrated right into their installers. As a result of that it gets easy to enable full-disk encryption even for a new installed Linux. For example, the latest versions of Ubuntu have the disk encryption software called LUKS (Linux Unified Key Setup.)
Conclusion
TrueCrypt was an effective, reliable and highly popular hard drive encryption tool. But after its development has got officially stopped, it is no more secure to use it. The latest version of the software, available for download on the designated website, only allows decrypting. The software is undergoing an independent audit.
Thus, it is better to use alternative options to ensure the security of your hard drives data. You can either go for open source tools like VeraCrypt, or use the inbuilt disk encryption feature of your operating system.
