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If you’re using a Professional or Enterprise edition of Windows, you also have access to some special encryption features. (Unless they use the freezer attack, which is uncommon in the real world.) This ensures that no one can access the contents of your hard drive as long as you leave your computer locked or powered off.

Encrypt your entire Windows system drive, forcing anyone to enter a password when booting your computer or resuming from hibernate.

TrueCrypt can be used as a portable application, allowing you to access your encrypted data even on computers that don’t have TrueCrypt installed - the TrueCrypt program files can be stored on the external drive itself.

Use TrueCrypt to create an encrypted volume on a USB flash drive or other removable drive, allowing you to carry sensitive files around with you worrying that they could be viewed if you ever lose the drive.

When you “unmount” the drive, no one can see its contents without providing your encryption passphrase. You’ll need your encryption password to “mount” this file as a special drive, allowing you to view and manipulate its contents.

Create a small encrypted container stored in a file on your hard drive.

TrueCrypt is a very flexible encryption solution, and you can use it in a variety of ways:

TrueCrypt allows you to create encrypted volumes. For example, Adobe Acrobat allows you to create password-protected PDF files, if Office’s PDF encryption isn’t your style. Other productivity programs may offer similar features. RELATED: How to Password Protect Documents and PDFs with Microsoft OfficeĬheck out this guide for more information on encrypting Word documents, Excel workbooks, PowerPoint presentations, and even PDFs. You can also fully decrypt the document in the future, removing the need for a password. You’ll be prompted to enter a password, which you’ll have to provide each time you open the document in the future. To password protect a document in Office 2010 or later, click the File menu, click the Protect Document button in the Info section, and select Encrypt With Password. Microsoft switched to AES encryption in Office 2007, so if you’re using an earlier version of Office, the encryption will be nowhere near as secure. Microsoft Office allows you to apply encryption to documents, securing them with a password.

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