--- /dev/null
+[eCryptfs][] is an encrypted filesystem for Linux. You'll need to
+have a kernel with the `ECRYPT_FS` module configured to use eCryptfs.
+Once you have the kernel setup, install the userspace tools
+(`sys-fs/ecryptfs-utils` on [[Gentoo]], where you may want to enable
+the `suid` `USE` flag to [allow non-root users to mount their private
+directories][suid]).
+
+ $ zcat /proc/config.gz | grep ECRYPT_FS
+ CONFIG_ECRYPT_FS=m
+ # echo 'sys-fs/ecryptfs-utils suid' >> /etc/portage/package.use/ecryptfs
+ # echo 'sys-fs/ecryptfs-utils ~amd64' >> /etc/portage/package.accept_keywords/ecryptfs
+ # emerge -av sys-fs/ecryptfs-utils
+ # modprobe ecryptfs
+
+eCryptfs is usually used to maintain encrypted home directories, which
+you can setup with [ecryptfs-setup-private][]. I used `--noautomount`
+because I'm not using the [PAM module][PAM] for automounting. Other
+than that, just follow the instructions. This sets up a directory
+with encrypted data in `~/.Private`, which you mount with
+[ecryptfs-mount-private][]. Mounting exposes the decrypted filesystem
+under `~/Private`, which you should use for all of your secret stuff.
+If you don't like the `~/Private` path, you can tweak
+`~/.ecryptfs/Private.mnt` as you see fit.
+
+ $ ecryptfs-setup-private --noautomount
+ $ ecryptfs-mount-private
+ $ mkdir ~/Private/my-secret-stuff
+
+To encrypt stuff that is bound to a specific path (e.g. `~/.mozilla`),
+you can move the source into `~/Private` and add symlinks from the
+canonical location to the encrypted location:
+
+ $ mv ~/.mozilla ~/Private/mozilla
+ $ ln -s ~/Private/mozilla ~/.mozilla
+
+Encrypting arbitrary directories
+================================
+
+You can also encrypt arbitrary directories using
+[mount][mount.ecryptfs]. This is useful if you have private
+information in a [[PostgreSQL]] database.
+
+ # /etc/init.d/postgresql-9.2 stop
+ # mv /var/lib/postgresql{,-plain}
+ # mkdir /var/lib/{.,}postgresql
+ # chown postgres:postgres /var/lib/{.,}postgresql
+ # mount -t ecryptfs /var/lib/{.,}postgresql
+ Passphrase:
+ Select cipher:
+ …
+ Would you like to proceed with the mount (yes/no)? : yes
+ Would you like to append sig [REDACTED] to
+ [/root/.ecryptfs/sig-cache.txt]
+ in order to avoid this warning in the future (yes/no)? : yes
+ Successfully appended new sig to user sig cache file
+ Mounted eCryptfs
+ # mv /var/lib/postgresql{-plain/*,/}
+ # rmdir /var/lib/postgresql-plain
+ # /etc/init.d/postgresql-9.2 start
+
+You can also specify mount options explicitly instead of entering them
+interactively. To figure out the proper incantation, look at the
+`mtab` entry after an interactive mount:
+
+ $ grep postgresql /etc/mtab
+ /var/lib/.postgresql /var/lib/postgresql ecryptfs rw,ecryptfs_sig=REDACTED,ecryptfs_cipher=aes,ecryptfs_key_bytes=16,ecryptfs_fnek_sig=REDACTED,ecryptfs_unlink_sigs 0 0
+
+You should also look over the mount helper options in
+[ecryptfs(7)][ecryptfs.7]. Then run future mounts with:
+
+ # mount -t ecryptfs -o rw,ecryptfs_cipher=aes,ecryptfs_key_bytes=16,ecryptfs_enable_filename_crypto=y,ecryptfs_passthrough=n,ecryptfs_sig=REDACTED,ecryptfs_fnek_sig=REDACTED,ecryptfs_unlink_sigs /var/lib/{.,}postgresql
+
+You can also add a line like:
+
+ /var/lib/.postgresql /var/lib/postgresql ecryptfs rw,ecryptfs_cipher=aes,ecryptfs_key_bytes=16,ecryptfs_enable_filename_crypto=y,ecryptfs_passthrough=n,ecryptfs_sig=REDACTED,ecryptfs_fnek_sig=REDACTED,ecryptfs_unlink_sigs,key=passphrase:passphrase_passwd_file=/home/wking/Private/ecryptfs/postgresql,noauto 0 0
+
+to your `/etc/fstab`. With a passphrase file containing:
+
+ passphrase_passwd=[passphrase]
+
+Add the `user` option to allow non-root mounts (see “The non-superuser
+mounts” section in [mount(8)][mount]). Once you've setup your
+`fstab`, you can mount the directory more intuitively with:
+
+ # mount /var/lib/postgresql
+
+[eCryptfs]: http://ecryptfs.org/
+[suid]: http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.file-systems.ecryptfs.general/131
+[ecryptfs-setup-private]: http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/raring/en/man1/ecryptfs-setup-private.1.html
+[PAM]: http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/raring/en/man8/pam_ecryptfs.8.html
+[ecryptfs-mount-private]: http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/raring/en/man1/ecryptfs-mount-private.1.html
+[mount.ecryptfs]: http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/raring/en/man8/mount.ecryptfs.8.html
+[ecryptfs.7]: http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/raring/en/man7/ecryptfs.7.html
+[mount]: http://man7.org/linux/man-pages/man8/mount.8.html
+
+[[!tag tags/linux]]
+[[!tag tags/tools]]