Secure FileSystem (SFS) for DOS/Windows


Features of SFS | How to Obtain SFS | Related Information

What is SFS?

SFS (Secure FileSystem) is a set of programs which create and manage a number of encrypted disk volumes, and runs under both DOS and Windows. Each volume appears as a normal DOS drive, but all data stored on it is encryped at the individual-sector level. Encrypted volumes can be loaded and unloaded as required, and can be quickly unloaded with a user-defined hotkey, or automatically unloaded after a period of inactivity. They can also be converted back to normal DOS volumes, or have their contents destroyed. The documentation includes an in-depth analysis of various security aspects of the software, as well as fairly complete design and programming details.

Features of SFS

FUNCTIONAL DESCRIPTION

Main Features

Note for NTFS Users / Users of Runtime Software products

Products from
Runtime Software like System Info and GetDataBack will occasionally erroneously report NTFS disks as containing SFS partitions. This is due to a bug in the Runtime Software products, which decide that finding partition type 42h on a Windows machine indicates that it's running the SFS real-mode MSDOS device driver rather than being an NTFS dynamic partition marker. See this news posting for more information on how to fix this. You may also want to report this bug to Runtime Software, although since it's remained unfixed for more than five years now it doesn't look like they're in a hurry to correct this.

ENCRYPTION CAPABILITIES

OTHER FEATURES

How to obtain the latest version of SFS

The latest full release of SFS is version 1.10, which is available from the
Garbo archive site in Finland.

The latest update release of SFS is version 1.17, which is available from the University of Hamburg archive site. This site can be rather slow, there is a mirror at the University of Milan archive site. Bandwidth to both these sites is limited outside Europe.

The JCFG utilities can be used to enhance the performance and ease of use of SFS.

Version 1.20 is almost ready, but since I'm very busy I haven't had much time to finish it. In 600 million years the sun will go out. I may have to finish 1.20 in the dark.

There is a free portable encryption library which contains the encryption code used in SFS, as well as a number of other encryption and hash algorithms. The library contains high-level encrypted object management routines which make implementing or adding encryption functionality to an existing program a breeze. The library is supplied as source code for Unix, DOS, Windows, Macintosh, and the Amiga, and also as 16- and 32-bit dynamic link libraries for Windows.

Related Information

There are a number of Web pages containing information on computer and information security in general, including links to security and cryptography-related web and gopher servers, FTP sites, newsgroups, mailing lists, bulletin boards, frequently-asked question (FAQ) lists and incident bulletins, conferences, seminars, workshops, and miscellaneous other sources.

The crypto link farm contains a large collection of links to other security, privacy, and encryption-related sites.

Information on software which will break the encryption used in a large number of commercial software packages, including WordPerfect (versions 4.2-6.1, regular or enhanced encryption), Microsoft Word (versions 2.0-6.1), Microsoft Excel (all versions including the Macintosh one), Lotus 1-2-3 (all versions), Quattro Pro, Paradox, Pkzip, Norton's Diskreet (both DES and proprietary encryption), Novell NetWare (versions 3.x-4.x), and others, is available from the AccessData home page.

Another encryption-breaking package is available from the CRAK Software home page.

A number of other references to information pertaining to SFS are given at the end of the SFS documentation.

Information last updated 2 September 1996.