On 17 Feb, 12:10, "Sebastian G." <se...@seppig.de> wrote:
> Vend wrote:
> >> Obviously: The partition table leaks information about the partition layout
> >> and the filesystems.
>
> > So?
>
> Encryption is supposed to provide concealment of all non-public information.

And what is the point of concealing a partition table?

> >> It also allows for distinguish from random data.
>
> > So? It's not like people would keep random data in their hard drives
> > anyway.
>
> Quite the contrary. I fill every freshly bought (rewritable) media with
> pseudorandom data for testing the storage. I overwrite every media I'm gonna
> sell or throw away with pseudorandom data. So, unless I actually use the
> media, they will be filled with pseudorandom data, so one shouldn't wonder
> if they're in this state
>
> Oh, and maybe I use FDE. That's why they might be filled with pseudorandom
> data as well.

If the media is in your possession, it's reasonable to assume that it
contains valid data, thus if the data looks random it's can be assumed
that at least some of it is ciphertext.

And anyway, with partition encryption, you could clear the disk by
creating a single partition and filling it with random data. If the
encryption software doesn't add any plaintext header to the partition,
the cleared media will be indistinguishable from one containing
encrypted data.