Patent · US Active

Methods and systems for attaching an encrypted data partition during the startup of an operating system

US9817675B1 · kind B1 · utility

4Cited by
6References
13Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventors

Key dates

Filing dateJan 31, 2017
Grant dateNov 14, 2017
Priority date
Expiry dateJan 31, 2037

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC G)Physics
  • CPC primaryG06F1/32
  • WIPO fieldComputer technology
  • WIPO sectorElectrical engineering

Abstract

During the startup of an operating system of a computing system, a monitoring process of the operating system is used to detect an entry point of a daemon manager process. In response to detecting the entry point, the startup process is paused, and an early attach process is launched so as to attach one or more encrypted data partitions to the operating system. As part of the early attach process, the network stack of the computing system may be initialized, which allows the early attach process to retrieve one or more decryption keys corresponding to the one or more encrypted data partitions from an external key management server. The one or more decryption keys may be transmitted to a disk filter driver of the operating system, which provides the operating system with access to the one or more encrypted data partitions. Upon the conclusion of the early attach process, the operating system startup process resumes with the one or more encrypted data partitions now accessible to the operating system.

Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.