Ubuntu
partman-crypto package

installer clobbered encrypted part. poor warning.

Bug #194946 reported by Jimlay on 2008-02-24

This bug report is a duplicate of: Bug #420080: Configure encrypted volumes destroys existing data. Edit Remove

Affects		Status	Importance	Assigned to	Milestone
	partman-crypto (Ubuntu)	Triaged	High	Unassigned

Bug Description

In the text-installer on the alternate-cd I tried to mount already existing luks partition in /media.

I instructed the installer to use hda2 as a luksEncrypted device. Then I selected "setup encrypted volumes". The message that appeared stated "After this you will no longer be able to make further changes to the underlaying partitions. Ok?" It then asked my crypt password and I provided my password needed to mount the volume.

From what I can tell, the installer used luksFormat with my password which created a new encryption key and overwrote the old one. I never formatted anything and I'm sure all the data was there but once you run luksFormat there is no recovering the data.

When I selected "setup encrypted volumes" the warning message should have been a lot more ominous and included language about "This will alter your partition table and may result in loss of data on the partitions selected for encryption. THIS IS A WRITE OPPERATION AND IS NOT REVERSABLE."

Idealy there would have been an option to mount an already created luks partition (hence using luksCreate).

Ubuntu 7.10 AMD64 - Alternate installer.

Revision history for this message

Anzenketh (anzenketh) wrote on 2010-02-22:

Set to triage for possible wishlist.

Revision history for this message

Anzenketh (anzenketh) wrote on 2010-02-22:

Thank you for taking the time to make Ubuntu better. Since what you submitted is not really a bug, or a problem, but rather an idea to improve Ubuntu, you are invited to post your idea in Ubuntu Brainstorm at http://brainstorm.ubuntu.com/ where it can be discussed, voted by the community and reviewed by developers. Thanks for taking the time to share your opinion!

Changed in partman-crypto (Ubuntu):
status:	New → Invalid

Revision history for this message

Colin Watson (cjwatson) wrote on 2010-03-04: Re: [Bug 194946] Re: installer clobbered encrypted part. poor warning.

On Mon, Feb 22, 2010 at 08:10:40PM -0000, Anzenketh wrote:
> Thank you for taking the time to make Ubuntu better. Since what you
> submitted is not really a bug, or a problem, but rather an idea to
> improve Ubuntu, you are invited to post your idea in Ubuntu Brainstorm
> at http://brainstorm.ubuntu.com/ where it can be discussed, voted by
> the community and reviewed by developers. Thanks for taking the time to
> share your opinion!

Sorry, but actions such as this do not help developers. This is a valid
bug on the installer UI. Please do not close it.

status triaged
severity high

Colin Watson (cjwatson) on 2010-03-04

Changed in partman-crypto (Ubuntu):
importance:	Undecided → High

Revision history for this message

Brian Murray (brian-murray) wrote on 2011-04-18:

Bug 420080 covers the same issue as this and has already been targeted for a release and assigned to a developer so I am going to mark this as duplicate of that one.