for all i know, there are very strong and precise requirements regarding encryption algorithms...

first, regulates what is permitted to "export" (to other countries, i think this is to make sure its nothing used by the military) and then the goverment will always demand the algorithm, so that they can decrypt the info.

thats normal procedure.

encryption is very important, not because of the government or wireless transfers, but your laptop can be stolen, or you loose your external HDDs etc etc...

General Mackevili wrote:Sorry, but this is related...

My Samsung Android phone has an option to encrypt it. Says it will takes hours to do.

I've always wanted to do that, but does it slow things down? Will it take an extra 30 minutes to boot it up every time or anything like that?

#clueless

I have my data partition encrypted on my android phone and tablet. Takes about an hour to encrypt (32gb) but guess it depends on your processor and storage capacity. It makes boot up about 15 seconds longer when it decrypts.

The downside is, except by using a xposed module, your decryption key is the same as your screen unlock key. So if you choose a good one it will be annoying to enter every time you need to unlock your device.

I'm glad I'd encrypted as when my phone got pinched in bali they couldn't access my documents. Do a lot of mobile banking and had heaps of personal family court documents on there. Etc...

Adds about a minute of boot time on our Moto's, otherwise no change - worth it IMO.

General Mackevili wrote:

potty wrote:encryption is very important, not because of the government or wireless transfers, but your laptop can be stolen, or you loose your external HDDs etc etc...

That. I doubt the NSA has ever bothered to read any of my emails, and they definitely haven't liked or commented on any of my Facebook posts.

Fair enough. I also don't keep anything on my laptop that can be used to harm me financially/etc. All of the cloud services I use (FB, gmail, etc) provide me the option to automatically log my accounts out across the board and change the passwords.

Thanks for all the info.
I'm going to stick with BitLocker because it is convenient and I don't have anything important to encrypt. It's good to be discreet though.