TrueCrypt is a software system for establishing and maintaining an on-the-fly-encrypted drive. On-the-fly encryption means that data are automatically encrypted or decrypted right before they are loaded or saved, without any user intervention. No data stored on an encrypted volume can be read (decrypted) without using the correct password or correct encryption key. Until decrypted, a TrueCrypt volume appears to be nothing more than a series of random numbers. The entire file system is encrypted (i.e., file names, folder names, contents of every file, and free space).
- New features:
- The I/O pipeline now uses read-ahead buffering, which improves read performance especially on solid-state drives, typically by 30-50%. (Windows)
Improvements, bug fixes, and security enhancements:
- The boot loader now supports motherboards with BIOSes that reserve large amounts of base memory (typically for onboard RAID controllers). Note: In order to be able to take advantage of this improvement under Windows Vista, you will have to install Service Pack 1 or higher first. Service Pack 1 for Windows Vista resolved an issue causing a shortage of free base memory during system boot. (Windows Vista/XP/2008/2003)
- Mounting using the "Auto-Mount Devices" feature may take significantly less time as partitions containing unencrypted filesystems are now skipped. (Windows)
- When volumes that are mounted as read-only or removable are saved as favorite volumes, they are mounted as read-only and/or removable when "Mount Favorite Volumes" is used.
- When a multiple-pass wipe algorithm is selected when performing in-place encryption of a non-system volume, the header areas will be wiped before the encrypted headers are written to the disk. Note: On an existing volume, you can perform such an operation by changing its password and/or keyfiles. (Windows)
- Many other minor improvements, bug fixes and security enhancements. (Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux)