• 0 Posts
  • 13 Comments
Joined 2 months ago
Cake day: April 30th, 2026
  • FedX@quokk.autoSelfhosted@lemmy.world•Anyone use Clevis + Tang to protect data on their home server?English
    2·
    2 hours ago

    Listened to a rather interesting episode of Darknet Diaries the other day about a European cyber crime group. To this day, the FBI has been unable to decrypt the devices. The feds didn’t give too many details about the specifics, but what they did share was quite interesting:

    • Five layers of encryption, each with unique passwords.
    • LUKS root partition presumably tied to TPM2.
    • Veracrypt or truecrypt volumes in userland.
    • A custom-made encryption toolkit.

    From what I gathered, I think the optimal balance of usability and security (especially for a headless machine) would be the following:

    • LUKS root volume tied to TPM to protect against cloning of disk. Also, nothing too valuable ever lives on root.
    • More important data stored behind a FUSE encryption layer like gocryptfs, these can be easily opened remotely. You can also tie the password to data hidden inside the LUKS volume for effective two-password protection if the volume is not already behind a LUKS layer.
    • If your really concerned, add in additional layers as needed. You can tie LUKS to TPM and FIDO, not sure if you can set up a two password mode, but that would be quite nice. You can also (probably) tie FUSE based systems to biometrics like Howdey or fingerprint sensors if you have them. This could also be setup in a kind of two-password mode for a single volume. Realistically, two layers of encryption is overkill, but it’s more about ensuring multiple layers of redundancy rather than making it harder to crack.
    • I can’t recommend systemd because of its numerous security vulnerabilities, but homed does have a neat feature where it will unmount encrypted home volumes when your computer goes to sleep. Not sure how effective or useful it is, but it is a nice feature. Been wanting to see if I can setup something similar on Chimera/Artix with dinit user services.
    • Defiantly set up duress key-codes/panic buttons. Likewise, been wanting to write a clone of swaylock with duress code support, but as far as I know, nothing of the sort exists right now.

    It is also very much worth noting, even though the FBI never got into the hackers’ computers, they had more than enough evidence to convict the lot. Being the defender of a computer system is always a losing battle.

  • FedX@quokk.autome_irl@lemmy.world•me_irlEnglish
    2·
    15 days ago

    I have some wild helicopter watching stories. Best would probably be when there was a small wildfire a few miles away from my college. I was watching the flight tracker and saw them pull in a Huey and Blackhawk, and tracked down exactly where they were collecting water. Ditched class and went to watch them. They let us get like 100ft away from these ridiculous massive machines as they were taking on water. At one point, the Blackhawk pilot started playing chicken with us, trying to see if he could knock us off the hillside, LOL. Even still I will go out and watch most helicopters.