KeePass

I like to use complex passwords for all of my online accounts, but trying to remember all the passwords is almost impossible. To help, I have been using a tool called Password Safe for the last year or so. The only complaint I had with this program is that you had to install it on every computer that you used it on. There is a portable version, but it costs money. About a month ago, I heard about KeePass Password Safe. This program is portable (for free!) and has all of the other features of Password Safe. The portability by itself convinced me to move all my password storing from Password Safe to KeePass.

USB Drive Security

I carry my 1GB USB Thumb Drive with me everywhere I go and I store some stuff on there that I wouldn't want anyone to get a hold of (Quicken backup & KeePass mainly). So this was the perfect opportunity to try out TrueCrypt 5.0a.

First, I did a full device encryption. I quickly found out that this wouldn't work for me, since in order to mount the device TrueCrypt has to be installed on the computer. I reformatted and then went the "Traveler" route. I used the version of TrueCrypt installed on my desktop to create a standard volume on my USB Drive. I went with a size of 950 MB, leaving roughly 32 MB for the "Traveler" install. After the volume was done, I went to Tools -> Traveler Disk Setup (on TrueCrypt's menu). I picked the root of my USB Drive as the create location and unchecked "Include Volume Creation..." since I had already created the volume. I also setup AutoRun to mount the volume I just created. Now, all I have to do is plug the Thumb Drive in, enter the password, and it's ready to go. And I don't have to worry about someone getting my sensitive data since they won't know my "secure" password to mount the drive.

NOTE: The "Traveler" install took up less than 1.5 MB on my thumb drive