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A Cloud Guru

Create and Mount an Encrypted Block Device Using dm-crypt

In this lab you will create an encrypted block device using `dm-crypt` and LUKS. Then you will open the encrypted device and create a filesystem on it. You are working as a System Administrator at a large financial institution and have been tasked with enabling whole-disk encryption on a portable drive. The portable drive is attached as `/dev/loop0` to the user's workstation, which is running the CentOS Linux 7.7 operating system.

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Path Info

Level

Intermediate

Duration

15m

Published

Jan 31, 2020

Challenge

Create an Encrypted Volume on the Target Device
Create an encrypted volume on the target device:
```
$ sudo cryptsetup luksFormat /loopbackfile.img
```

Challenge

Open the Encrypted Volume

Open the encrypted volume:

$ sudo cryptsetup luksOpen /dev/loop0 encvol
$ ls /dev/mapper/ -l

Challenge

Create a Filesystem on the Encrypted Volume
Create a filesystem on the encrypted volume:
```
$ sudo mkfs.ext4 /dev/mapper/encvol
$ sudo mount /dev/mapper/encvol /mnt/
```
Challenge

Unmount the Filesystem and Close the Encrypted Volume
Unmount the filesystem and close the encrypted volume:
```
$ sudo umount /mnt/
$ sudo cryptsetup luksClose encvol
```

Challenge

Create a Keyfile and Add It to the Encrypted Volume

Create a keyfile and add it to the encrypted volume:

$ sudo dd if=/dev/urandom of=/root/lukskey bs=4096 count=1
$ sudo chmod 600 /root/lukskey
$ sudo cryptsetup luksAddKey /dev/loop0 /root/lukskey

Challenge

Open the Encrypted Volume Using the Keyfile and Mount the Filesystem
Open the encrypted volume using the keyfile and mount the filesystem:
```
sudo cryptsetup luksOpen /dev/loop0 encvol --key-file /root/lukskey
sudo mount /dev/mapper/encvol /mnt/
```

Author

A Cloud Guru

The Cloud Content team comprises subject matter experts hyper focused on services offered by the leading cloud vendors (AWS, GCP, and Azure), as well as cloud-related technologies such as Linux and DevOps. The team is thrilled to share their knowledge to help you build modern tech solutions from the ground up, secure and optimize your environments, and so much more!

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Create and Mount an Encrypted Block Device Using dm-crypt

Path Info

Table of Contents

Create an Encrypted Volume on the Target Device