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TrueCrypt - Encrypting an Existing Drive

TrueCrypt is a software that can help you encrypt your data, thereby keeping your data secure. There are many ways to use TrueCrypt, but one of the most common question is "how to encrypt your existing data drive?" The classic answer has always been: 1) encrypt an empty drive; and 2) copy the data to the new encrypted drive. That's because previously, TrueCrypt couldn't encrypt an existing drive. Now there is a way and this article details the process.

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Requirements

The catch is that you can't do it on all operating systems and you can't do it with all TrueCrypt versions.

First of all, you should get the latest version of TrueCrypt. As of this writing, TrueCrypt version 7.1a can encrypt an existing data drive in place.

Second, you need an operating system that can perform the encryption on an existing drive. With Windows, you'll need Windows Vista or greater. Any previous Windows version cannot perform this task. For example, if you attempt to perform in-place encryption on Windows XP, you'll get the following error message:

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Procedure

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Related Links

• TrueCrypt

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