Appreciate the response. Yes that is correct. I am asking about the plausibility of denying one's access to an encrypted volume because the keyfile is lost when there is no keyfile in actuality. Legal factors aside (i.e. burden of proof of security level and absence of backups) why is this a losing strategy? Could a forensic analysis or otherwise prove the false claim one is making about the absence of a non-existent keyfile? You seemed to have answered this by indicating the initrd or init-script giving away the presence or non-presence of a keyfile. To mitigate this one could place the boot partition on a USB and claim that it is lost. Now, without access to the initrd or init-scripts what does that mean for attempts to detecting the use of a keyfile? On Thu, May 23, 2013, at 16:55, Arno Wagner wrote: > On Thu, May 23, 2013 at 03:27:25PM +0200, sector9@xxxxxxxx wrote: > > During the boot stage is it possible for an attacker with physical > > access to detect if a keyfile is used to unlock an encrypted volume? > > Yes, very easily. Just look at the initrd or init-script that does it. > Booting with a USB/CD Linux (e.g. Knoppix) makes this easy, including > the test whether the keyfile is valid. > > > Does it yield to protest that the keyfile is lost/unknown/destroyed when > > in reality there is no keyfile but instead a regular non-keyfile > > passphrase? > > Aehm, what are you asking? Whether you could lie about the former > presence of a keyfile and claim the data is now inacessible due > to its absence? That depends very much so how much technological > knowledge those have that should believe it and what mechnism for > its loss or destruction you propose. Also, keyfiles are not > secure, so you would have to justify the low securuity level and > the absebce of backups as well. > > Generally, I would call it a losing strategy. > > Arno > -- > Arno Wagner, Dr. sc. techn., Dipl. Inform., Email: > arno@xxxxxxxxxxx > GnuPG: ID: CB5D9718 FP: 12D6 C03B 1B30 33BB 13CF B774 E35C 5FA1 CB5D > 9718 > ---- > There are two ways of constructing a software design: One way is to make > it > so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies, and the other way is > to > make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies. The first > method is far more difficult. --Tony Hoare > _______________________________________________ > dm-crypt mailing list > dm-crypt@xxxxxxxx > http://www.saout.de/mailman/listinfo/dm-crypt _______________________________________________ dm-crypt mailing list dm-crypt@xxxxxxxx http://www.saout.de/mailman/listinfo/dm-crypt
