What is your experience with various password protecting programs?

[Robg54]

I have tried several programs that are designed to password protect folders that contain information I would rather not share with others.

While they seem perfectly able to password protect a folder, this folder seems far from secure. In each case, the folder itself is not accessible without entering the password, but the files are visible in the finder under "recent documents".

I was hoping for a program that could securely protect these documents from casual viewing (including the "search for" section of the finder bar) while being relatively user friendly. I don't care about encryption. I don't need to protect anything from a dedicated attack. I also prefer that it doesn't have a long loading time to open files or serious risk of corruption.

Maybe I am asking too much. If the program is what I'm looking for, I would even consider paying for it.

I tried creating a disk image through hard drive utility, but it took a while (several minutes) to and this doesn't really fit my use.

 

[Doctor Q]

I've settled on Exces from Azure Talon. I just tested it by unlocked a folder, viewing a test file, quitting TextEdit, and locking the folder. Interestingly, the file name was in the Finder's Recent Items list but not in TextEdit's File->Open Recent menu.

You can of course give your files unrevealing names, or clear the Recent Items list whenever you want, but I understand that you want more convenience than that. So Exces doen't provide it. Maybe Azure Talon would like a suggestion for a new feature!

 

[Consultant]

Have Quick user switching, and make a separate user for others.

That way other people can't view your pron.
You can exclude it from spotlight.

 

[jxel]

...

what are you trying to hide...?

 

[Robg54]

Well, what prompted me to refresh my password protect program is tax information (You know, tax day was yesterday). But in reality I have a variety of items. I have chat transcripts and other private correspondence I don't want generally available (and no, it's not like I'm cheating or anything), private financial data, some images and a few assorted random items.

 

[maverick72]

www.knoxformac.com

Encrypted secure vaults. Works like a charm.

 

[Jethryn Freyman]

Password protecting folders and accounts provides no security for data.

Disk Utility can create encrypted disk images which work well for files. If you need even better security, you can use TrueCrypt.

If you deal with important sensitive files often, you should turn on Filevault, so that temporary files and preferences and chat logs and such are encrypted in your home folder (but temporary files and logs outside your home folder remain unprotected.)