Safe

Safe is the keyword of this program, is the concept which this program is based on.

A Safe is equivalent with a new partition, a new virtual disk drive added to your existent physical ones. The Safe is password protected, and uses to store the information or file on the physical disk. This file is called container file.

You can have several Safes on your hard drive, depending of course on their size and on the capacity of your real hard-disk.

After a Safe is opened (enabled), you can perform the normal file operations you do with any disk drive: copy files to Safe, copy files from Safe, delete, move or rename file, install programs, run applications, an so on. The virtual drive of the safe will have a letter assigned to it, just like the other drive letters. The letters of the virtual safes are usually letters from the end of the alphabet (...,X,Y,Z). When you no longer need to work with the file from the safe, just close the safe and the drive associated with this safe will become invisible.

After a Safe is closed, the drive letter will disappear and your information won't be accessible to unwanted users. You can change the properties of a Safe, like the password, size, letter, container file, only when the safe is closed.

Files stored inside a Safe are encrypted. SafeBit uses on-the-fly encryption to encrypt any data you place in the Safe. This process is completely transparent to you!

The first time you run SafeBit you will be prompted to create your first safe. Later you can create additional safes to fit your needs for security, portability, risk distribution, organize your files in types of informations.

To create a Safe on follow these steps:

• Select the action: New Safe from the main page.
• Enter a name and password for the Safe:

  

  • Fill in the name for the Safe in the first field. You will notice that SafeBit assigns a default name for every safe, of course you can change this name. The name field is a required one. You can not create a safe without a name. This name will identify your safe in the list of safes.
  • Description: fill in a description of the current safe. This field is optional. If you are working in a friendly environment you might want to give a description for the safe, to remind you what type of information you put in this safe.
  • Password: type in the password for the safe you want to create. Click * button to make the password visible. Confirm the password by retyping it. Warning - If you forget the password of a Safe, you will never be able to access it or even to destroy it.
• Enter Properties (location of Container File, size and letter)

  

  

  • Every safe has a Container File. In this section you may choose a different name and location for the Container File, the size of the safe, and assigned letter.
  • Choose a name and location for the Container File. By default the location is: C:\Program Files\SafeBit\Safes\NameOfTheSafe.safe. We recommend this default name and location. The name of the Container File is by default the name of the safe. You can change the name and the location of the Container File. Use the browse button on the right to choose a different location for the Container File. Note: We recommend you to keep the Safe in the default container folder for better security.
  • Select the size of the safe by dragging the size bar or by entering a value in MBytes in the box.
  • Select the letter to be assigned to the Safe (when the safe is opened).
  • By marking the checkbox in the bottom of the window, Safe's characteristics won't be displayed in the main window.
  • Click Next to create the Safe
  • When the process is completed, click the Finish button to return to the main window. You will notice that the default status of any safe is "closed". Double-Click it to open it.

Open Safe

To work with the files inside a safe, or put new files inside the safe, you must first open the safe.

Only after a Safe is opened, the information stored in the Container File is decrypted in real-time and you can perform operations on your files. Access to the safe is, of course, password protected.

Close Safe

A Safe is perfectly secured only when it is closed. Always close your safe when you're done working with it. You can also use the automatic closure system, that closes your safe if idle for several minutes.

Destroy Safe

You can use this function to destroy a Safe. By destroying a Safe you delete the Container File, and all the information inside it, without any chance of recovering it. Unless you've made a backup of the safe you will never be able to recover the files from a destroyed Safe.