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  1. Home
  2. NetBackup™ Security and Encryption Guide
  3. Section III. Encryption of data at rest
  4. Data at rest encryption security
  5. Configuring standard encryption on clients
  6. About configuring standard encryption from the server
  7. Creating the key files
NetBackup™ Security and Encryption Guide

Creating the key files

For each encryption client, run the following command:

bpkeyutil -clients client_name

You are prompted for a new pass phrase to add to that client's key file.

To set up several clients to use the same pass phrase, specify a comma-separated list of client names, as follows:

bpkeyutil -clients client_name1,client_name2,...,client_namen

To create the key file, NetBackup uses the pass phrase you specify.

NetBackup uses the pass phrase you specify to create the key file, as follows:

  • NetBackup uses a combination of the following two algorithms to create a key from the pass phrase that is up to 256 bits.

    • Secure hashing algorithm, or SHA1

    • Message digest algorithm, or MD5

  • NetBackup uses the NetBackup private key and 128-bit AES algorithm to encrypt the key.

  • The key is stored in the key file on the client.

  • At run time, NetBackup uses the key and a random initialization vector to encrypt the client data. The initialization vector is stored in the header of the backup image.

Previous pass phrases remain available in the file for restores of the backups that were encrypted with those phrases.

Caution:

You must ensure that pass phrases, whether they are new or were in use previously, are secure and retrievable. If a client's key file is damaged or lost, you need all of the previous pass phrases to recreate the key file. Without the key file, you cannot restore the files that were encrypted with the pass phrases.

The key file must only be accessible to the administrator of the client machine. For a UNIX client, you must ensure the following:

  • The owner is root.

  • The mode bits are 600.

  • The file is not on a file system that can be NFS mounted.

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