Encrypt your hard disk in C#

Question

How to secure a hard disk programmatically through C#?

Like if a user wants to open a hard disk and first he/she has to give a password to access it. If the password is wrong then the hard disk is hidden from that user..

Answer 1

If you're trying to do this inside an app written in C#:

Get logical drives:

string[] drives = Directory.GetLogicalDrives();

Also check this out: http://www.experts-exchange.com/Programming/Languages/C_Sharp/Q_23825199.html

http://bytes.com/topic/c-sharp/answers/276247-get-drive-letter-win32_diskdrive

You'll need to expand that more. Associate a drive letter with a password and keep that stored somewhere. If the entered password is correct, show that drive as you already have a list/array of them. (note it's too early for me to write this all out and I have a cold - but it's fairly simple).

You have your list of drives, you check a password to see if they can see a drive, if so let them see it.

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If you are trying to restrict the entire windows system from showing drive letters based on a password, I would say do not use C#. This is a windows security issue.

I would recommend reading abot MS Group Policies. This article can help you: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/231289

Answer 2

I don't think this can be done transparently (you can access the file with any program) and securely (that is, the disk is actually encrypted, not just hidden from the shell) in C# (on Windows, not on Singularity). To decrypt the disk on the fly you need a kernel mode driver. And you can't write that in .NET.

On Linux you might be able to write a FUSE (usermode) driver in C#+Mono.