Raspberry Pi

How to Install and Use VeraCrypt on Raspberry Pi

VeraCrypt is a free and open-source tool used to create a virtual encrypted disk that works similarly to a regular disk, but it stores the disk information in an encrypted file. It lets you create a virtual disk as a file and can later easily create a disk from this file whenever you want. Thus, it helps you secure your system storage by not allowing unauthorized users to access your disk.

In this article, we will show you how to install VeraCrypt on your Raspberry Pi device and create a virtual disk on your Raspberry Pi system.

Install and Use VeraCrypt on Raspberry Pi

You can easily install VeraCrypt from a Debian package, which you can download from the website. You must make sure to download the latest version of the software.

During this article write-up, the latest version is “1.25.9” and you can download this package for armhf-based architecture using the following command:

$ wget https://udomain.dl.sourceforge.net/project/veracrypt/VeraCrypt%201.25.9/Linux/veracrypt-1.25.9-Debian-10-armhf.deb

After successfully downloading the VeraCrypt deb package, install it on your Raspberry Pi system through the following command:

$ sudo apt install ./veracrypt-1.25.9-Debian-armhf.deb -y

You can confirm the VeraCrypt installation from the following command:

$ veracrypt --version

Run VeraCrypt on Raspberry Pi

You can run VeraCrypt on Raspberry Pi from the terminal using the command “veracrypt”.

To run VeraCrypt from the desktop, go to the application menu and find the application in the “Accessories” option.

Use VeraCrypt to Create a Virtual Disk

Now to create a virtual encrypted disk, go to the “Create New Volume” option within the application as shown below.

Go with the default option as appears on the initial VeraCrypt Volume Creation Wizard.

Choose the “Standard VeraCrypt Volume” option and proceed to the next step.

Select the location where you want your encrypted disk to be placed.

Choose the Encryption algorithm and I am going with the default one “AES”.

Choose the Volume Size for the disk according to your choice.

Setup a strong password for your disk and note down it as it will be required later.

Select your Disk Format as well and here I am going with the default option, which is FAT.

Now, click on the “Format” button to start creating an encrypted disk on your Raspberry Pi system from VeraCrypt.

Wait until you receive a message about the successful creation of VeraCrypt volume on the screen.

How to Create a Disk on Desktop from an Encrypted Disk File

You can create a disk from an encrypted disk file whenever you want using the following steps:

Step 1: Select and upload the encrypted disk file from your Raspberry Pi system using the “Select File” option.

Step 2: Now click on the “Mount” option.

Step 3: Enter the password that you set during the process of creating the encrypted disk.

Wait for the process until it completes creating the disk from the encrypted file on your Raspberry Pi system.

When the process is finished, you will see the disk image on your desktop, which confirms that VeraCrypt has successfully created the disk image from your encrypted file.

Conclusion

VeraCrypt is a perfect application for creating a virtual disk image, making it challenging for an unauthorized person to read this file. Thus, it’s a perfect application for users who want to secure their storage system. Through the above guidelines, you will learn how to install the VeraCrypt tool on your Raspberry Pi system and start creating a virtual disk to secure your device storage. You will also find help to create the disk image from the encrypted file through VeraCrypt.

About the author

Awais Khan

I'm an Engineer and an academic researcher by profession. My interest for Raspberry Pi, embedded systems and blogging has brought me here to share my knowledge with others.