Comment Backing up the encryption key? (Score 1) 237
I think the single biggest problem with encrypting online backups is that it ties your backup right back to your local computer. If all the information on Amazon is encrypted with a key that is stored on your personal computer, you may as well have all the data on the personal computer in the first place, since your data goes *kaput* if you hard drive fails anyways.
This introduces the need for multiple storage sites for your key, which will presumably have the key in cleartext. All that Big Brother would need to do to get the data would be to figure out where else the key was stored, and use that to decrypt the data.
Any thoughts on this? Or is the best way to just use a long passphrase, store the key on the server, and hope that when you need to recover when your hard drive fails 2 years from now, you remember your long, hard-to-guess password...
Seems awkward to me...
This introduces the need for multiple storage sites for your key, which will presumably have the key in cleartext. All that Big Brother would need to do to get the data would be to figure out where else the key was stored, and use that to decrypt the data.
Any thoughts on this? Or is the best way to just use a long passphrase, store the key on the server, and hope that when you need to recover when your hard drive fails 2 years from now, you remember your long, hard-to-guess password...
Seems awkward to me...
