Securing your files

PE Explorer Series includes an extremely powerful encryption tools for Pocket PC.

Now you can encrypt your important documents, passwords, sensitive financial information and personal data, etc and knowing that they are safe and secure; you can send encrypted information through emails and don't have to worry about someone spying on it; even if your Pocket PC is stolen, knowing that your information is safe from prying eyes will make you sleep better at night.

Just how secure is PE Encrypt?

PE Encrypt utilizes the next generation Cryptography standard Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) and support 256-bit key size encryption.

To put it into perspective, assuming that one could build a machine that could recover a current 56-bit Data Encryption Standard (DES) key in a second (i.e., try 255 keys per second), then it would take that machine approximately 149 thousand-billion (149 trillion) years to crack a 128-bit AES key. The universe is believed to be less than 20 billion years old!!!

The Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) will be a new Federal Information Processing Standard (FIPS) Publication that will specify a cryptographic algorithm for use by U.S. Government organizations to protect sensitive (unclassified) information. For more information on AES, please visit http://www.nist.gov/aes/.

For your convenience, there is also a free full feature PE Encrypt2 for Windows Desktop so that files can be encrypted or decrypted on the desktop PC. The operations of PE Encrypt2 are almost exactly the same as PE Encrypt for Pocket PC.

To encrypt a file

1. Select the file you want to encrypt. In the following example, Memo2.psw.
   
   
   
2. Click menu File, point to Encrypt. The following screen will appear.
   
   
   
3. Fill in the necessary information including password.
   • Password: Enter the password used to encrypt or decrypt the selected file.
   • Confirm: Confirm by entering the password again.
   • Operation: Encrypt or decrypt.
   • Output: Output file name.
     
     
   • Apply to all selected items: Check this option if you want to apply the same settings to all selected files and save the current preference.
   • Save output as original: Check this option if you want to save the encrypted or decrypted output file as the original file. 
   • Remove original after operation: If this option is checked, the original files will be removed afterwards for encrypt or decrypt operations.
   • Remove unencrypted after operation: If this option is checked, the unencrypted file will be removed. For encrypt operation, the original file will be removed. For decrypt operation, the decrypted file will be removed after viewing/editing. The decrypted file will be monitored to determine if it is in use or not. The decrypted file will be removed after it is no longer in use. This option allows you to have only the encrypted file on your Pocket PC.
     
     The above four options in various combinations provide very fine control on how to handle original files, encrypted files or unencrypted files while ensuring convenient operations.
     
     For maximum protection of your data, Vieka recommends not to delete unencrypted file initially. After you obtain the encrypted file, try to decrypt the encrypted file by clicking menu File, pointing to Decrypt. Then open the decrypted file and verify that it is the same as the original. You may delete the original file at this point if you decide to do so.
     
4. Click button Submit. An encrypted file, in this example, Memo2.enc, is created.
   
   
   

Notes

• To select consecutive files or folders to copy or move, click the first item, press and hold down SHIFT in the small keyboard, and then click the last item.
• To select files or folders that are not consecutive, press and hold down CTRL in the small keyboard, and then click each item. In Pocket PC, hold the Action Button.

To decrypt a file

1. Select the file you want to decrypt. In the following example, Memo2.enc. Click menu File, point to Decrypt.
   You can also double click on the file to bring up the encrypt/decrypt screen automatically, allowing true one click encrypt/decrypt operation.
   
   
   
2. The following screen will appear.
   
   
   
3. Fill in the necessary information including password.
   • Password: Enter the password used to encrypt or decrypt the selected file.
   • Confirm: Confirm by entering the password again.
   • Operation: Encrypt or decrypt.
   • Output: Output file name.
     
     
   • Apply to all selected items: Check this option if you want to apply the same settings to all selected files and save the current preference.
   • Save output as original: Check this option if you want to save the encrypted or decrypted output file as the original file. 
   • Remove original after operation: If this option is checked, the original files will be removed afterwards for encrypt or decrypt operations.
   • Remove unencrypted after operation: If this option is checked, the unencrypted file will be removed. For encrypt operation, the original file will be removed. For decrypt operation, the decrypted file will be removed after viewing/editing. The decrypted file will be monitored to determine if it is in use or not. The decrypted file will be removed after it is no longer in use. This option allows you to have only the encrypted file on your Pocket PC.
     
     The above four options in various combinations provide very fine control on how to handle original files, encrypted files or unencrypted files while ensuring convenient operations.
     
     For maximum protection of your data, Vieka recommends not to delete unencrypted file initially. After you obtain the encrypted file, try to decrypt the encrypted file by clicking menu File, pointing to Decrypt. Then open the decrypted file and verify that it is the same as the original. You may delete the original file at this point if you decide to do so.
     
4. Click button Submit. A decrypted file, in this example, Memo2.dec, is created.
   
   
   

Notes

• Password to encrypt/decrypt a file is not stored anywhere to provide maximum security protection. If wrong password is given in encrypt/decrypt operation, the output file is not usable and there is no way for anyone to retrieve the password.
• To verify if a password is entered properly, you can also utilize checksum feature. The checksum of the original file is saved in a file so the subsequent decrypted file will be checked against this checksum. If these two checksum values does not match, then the password is wrong.
• To select consecutive files or folders to copy or move, click the first item, press and hold down SHIFT in the small keyboard, and then click the last item.
• To select files or folders that are not consecutive, press and hold down CTRL in the small keyboard, and then click each item. In Pocket PC, hold the Action Button.