ByteCrypt

Encryption command line application on single file or entire directories.

CAUTION

this is very much a work in progress, and is undergoing rapid development that may break between commits.

What is ByteCrypt?

ByteCrypt came about because I wanted the conveience of using all of the popular cloud file storage options, without the worry of storing my documents that contained PII (personally identifiable information).

I also wanted a way for people who are not adept in encryption, computers, etc. to be able to get a simple program that they can use as a additional layer of security to protect their most senitive files, while maintaining ease of use.

Encryption

ByteCrypt uses chacha20poly1305 (RFC 8439) for it's encryption, using 256-bit keys and a unique 96-bit nonce for every file.

Compression

file size can quickly get out of hand, especially when you are backing up to the cloud. That's why we use Zstandard to compress files before encryption.

You can configure your level of compression from the configuration file.

Getting Started

Getting Google Service Account

Becuase this is a public source repository, we are unable to place our client ID and client secret in the repo. because of this, you will have to go out and create a service account (free) to enable ByteCrypt access to use your Google Drive.

service account instructions

after following the instructions, please download the json file (named google.json !) to:

Windows: C:/Users/USER/crypt_config/.config/google.json

Linux: ~/home/USER/crypt_config/.config/google.json

Dependencies

currently being tested on windows 10,11, wsl(ubuntu), and Arch linux. requires minimum Rust version > 1.70.

Installing

Install the rust toolchain in order to have cargo installed by following this guide.
go to our release page and download the latest
Clone the repository, and go to the root project directory. Run cargo install --path .

Basic premise

In the spirit of the KISS principle, this is our overall design for ByteCrypt. no matter where you are in your file directory, you can always quickly encrypt, decrypt files as needed.

Basic Commands

for the full list, please see Commands.md.

Encrypt

no matter where you are in your file system, encrypting a file or folder is as easy as:

crypt encrypt ./important_documents # folder and all contents, including sub-directories
crypt encrypt tax_return.pdf        # single file

Your encrypted version of those folders / files will appear in your local crypt folder. to quickly see what files you have in your crypt folder, simply crypt ls

C:\Users\Ryan\crypt
└── dracula.crypt

Decrypt

Decryption works slightly different than encrypt. Decrypt is only looking at your crypt folder, since that is where the *.crypt files will live.

Running crypt decrypt will bring up the chooser™, which looks something like this:

please choose from the following: (or 0 to abort)
#   files                                         last modified 
----------------------------------------------------------------
1   \dracula.crypt                                01/15/24 21:12
2   \some\folder\dracula.crypt                    01/15/24 21:15
----------------------------------------------------------------

#   folders
----------------------------------------------------------------
3   \crypt
4   \crypt\some
5   \crypt\some\folder

Simply select your file or folder and we will take care of the rest.

all decrypted files will end up in crypt/decrypted

C:\Users\Ryan\crypt
├── decrypted
│   └── dracula.txt
...

Config

want more compression? want to change the crypt folder path? no problem. use crypt config to change the defaults.

config
    database-path, -d  View or update the database path
    crypt-path,    -c  View or update the crypt folder path
    ignore-items,  -i  View or change which directories and/or filetypes are to be ignored
    hwid               View or change current pc name associated with the cloud
    zstd-level,    -z  View or change the compression level (-7 to 22) higher is more compression
    load-default,  -l  Revert config back to default

Upload

google upload for both files and folders is mostly completed. ensure you follow the google setup instuctions prior to trying upload.

Download

also a work in progress!

Authors

Creator Ryan M - Twitter @Extremely_Ryan

Core Contruibutor: Josh

email: thebytecrypt@gmail.com

Version History

still working on it!

License

This project is licensed under the [MIT] License - see the LICENSE.md file for details

Acknowledgments

Inspiration, code snippets, etc.

awesome-readme

ExtremelyRyan/ByteCrypt