AMCRYPT(8)

🎀 AMCRYPT 💅

okay bestie, so this is amcrypt(8) — a System Administration Command, no big deal, just the reference crypt program for Amanda symmetric data encryption. she's iconic, she's the blueprint, let's get into it ✨

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🌸 NAME 🌸

amcrypt — the reference crypt program for Amanda symmetric data encryption. that's literally her whole job and she ate 💖

✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

amcrypt

that's it. that's the whole synopsis. no flags, no arguments, she just goes 🦋

💜 DESCRIPTION 💜

so amcrypt requires aespipe, uuencode and gpg to work — like, she literally cannot function without all three, they're her ride-or-dies. and aespipe? you can grab that from: http://loop-aes.sourceforge.net (yes the link is in the original, i'm just the messenger 🫶)

when amcrypt goes looking for the aespipe program, she checks these directories, in this order, no cap:

/usr/bin:/usr/local/bin:/sbin:/usr/sbin

then amcrypt calls amaespipe and passes the passphrase through file descriptor 3 (iykyk 👀). and where does that passphrase live? it should be stored in ~amanda/.am_passphrase. protect it like you'd protect your stan account password, fr fr 🔥

🔑 HOW TO CREATE ENCRYPTION KEYS FOR AMCRYPT 🔑

bestie this part is the main character energy of the whole page, so pay attention 🌈

1. Create 65 random encryption keys and encrypt those keys using gpg. heads up though — reading from /dev/random may take indefinitely long if the kernel's random entropy pool is empty 😭 if that happens, do some other work on some other console (use keyboard, mouse and disks) — literally just wiggle stuff around and let the entropy build, you got this 💀

head -c 2925 /dev/random | uuencode -m - | head -n 66 | tail -n 65 \ |
gpg --symmetric -a > ~amanda/.gnupg/am_key.gpg

this will ask for a passphrase. remember this passphrase because you will need it in the next step. write it down, put it in your notes app, tattoo it on your arm, idk, just don't lose it 🙈

2. Store the passphrase inside the home-directory of the AMANDA-user and protect it with proper permissions:

echo my_secret_passphrase > ~amanda/.am_passphrase
chown amanda:disk ~amanda/.am_passphrase
chmod 700 ~amanda/.am_passphrase

look at those permissions. 700. she's locked down. slay 👑

👑 KEY AND PASSPHRASE 👑

amcrypt uses the same key to encrypt and decrypt data. one key, doing both jobs, versatile queen 💅

it is very important to store and protect the key and the passphrase properly. encrypted backup data can only be recovered with the correct key and passphrase. lose them and it's gone-gone, no cap, no undo button 😭

🦋 SEE ALSO 🦋

• amanda(8)
• amanda.conf(5)
• aespipe(1)
• amaespipe(8)
• gpg(1)

and the Amanda Wiki, right here: http://wiki.zmanda.com/ — go be nosy, it's fine 💖

🌟 AUTHOR 🌟

Kevin Till <kevin.till@zmanda.com> Zmanda, Inc. (http://www.zmanda.com)

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okay that's the whole page, you're officially educated ✨ this was Amanda 3.5.4, dated 07/23/2025, and it's AMCRYPT(8) — go forth and encrypt responsibly, bestie 💜🎀