Encrypt Dropbox Securely: How to Protect Your Sensitive Files in the Cloud With Cryptomator
You want to encrypt your Dropbox and protect your privacy – and still have all the freedom in how you organize your data? That's where Cryptomator comes in.
With Cryptomator, you can encrypt your cloud storage by creating a vault in Dropbox and putting your files into it. With this extra layer of security, you’ll build an almost insurmountable barrier against attackers – without restricting Dropbox’s file storage and synchronization.
How Cryptomator Secures Your Dropbox Encryption
Cryptomator puts the data in your Dropbox into a “magic” vault. Magical because the entire vault and its contents only appear with the right password – and only to the person with the right password.
When the door to the vault is closed again, the entire vault and its valuable contents disappear again until the next time you open it with the right password.
This means that attackers would not even benefit from drilling through the wall of the vault. Because the vault is empty if the correct password is missing. (For Marvel fans: It works similarly to the portal in Doctor Strange).
Encrypt Your Dropbox and Reliably Protect Your Data: This Is How Cryptomator Helps You
Use Dropbox as before
You can keep your folder structure in Dropbox as before – Cryptomator adapts seamlessly. You can encrypt individual folders of your Dropbox and leave files or folders unencrypted.
Share protected data conveniently with friends, family, and colleagues
Make your data safe in the cloud and maintain privacy across multiple computers with Cryptomator. All you need is Cryptomator on each device and the password to gain access to the data.
Only those have access to your cloud data who should have it
End-to-end encryption makes it even harder for potential attackers to harm you. That's because encrypted file names mean third parties can't draw conclusions about file types – which is one of the most common gateways for them to get in.
Files don't accidentally get overwritten
If several devices access a document at the same time, and synchronization conflicts arise as a result, Cryptomator detects them despite file name encryption. Additionally, the version history from your cloud storage provider is preserved so that you can restore old versions of individual files. Note: Finding the correct file to restore is currently practically unfeasible, but will soon be possible in Cryptomator 1.7.0.
Quickly access your sensitive data in Dropbox from everywhere
Cryptomator is specifically designed to encrypt cloud services. Because the files are encrypted individually, only the files you just changed are uploaded or encrypted – and not (as with so-called "container solutions") the entire folder. Changes are synchronized much faster – and this is especially noticeable when you are on the road.
And This Is How Cryptomator Works in Practice
If you want the vault to appear with your files, you first open Cryptomator. Now you enter your password and the vault appears (in the form of a virtual drive in your file explorer).
Never worked with a virtual drive before? A virtual drive works like a USB flash drive. So the drive is only visible as long as the USB stick is connected. If you eject the stick, the USB drive disappears again.
We call this virtual drive “vault drive”. You can open it as usual and edit the data. As soon as you click “Lock Vault” in Cryptomator, the virtual drive is removed (and with it, the access to the sensitive data). The vault is now gone again.
By the way, you can create as many vaults as you like to organize your data individually.
How to Easily Use Cryptomator With Your Dropbox
- Install Cryptomator.
- Once Cryptomator is installed, you can create a new vault.
- Give your vault a name.
- Now select Dropbox as the storage location of your vault.
- Enter a password.
And you have successfully created your first vault.
If you want, you can unlock it immediately and reveal the virtual drive.
Here you can store your sensitive files to encrypt them in Dropbox.