Introduction

A short intro to encryption of credentials or backup files

ElectricSheep.IO supports public-key encryption based on GNU Privacy Guard - GPG.

When using ES.IO, there are two different use cases for encryption:

  • you want to encrypt secrets added to your Sheepfile - such as passwords or access keys - using ES.IO's public key so that you may share your Sheepfile safely, be it on a public repository
  • you want ES.IO to encrypt the backup files it creates using your public key, so that they may be stored securely in the Cloud

Each of these use cases rely on two different keypairs:

  • to encrypt your credentials, generate a specific keypair for ES.IO. You should use the public key to encrypt your passwords and secret keys, and make the private key available to the program so that it may decrypt them. See Encrypt your credentials for more.
  • to make ES.IO encrypt backup files, you should do the opposite. You should make your public key available to the program for encryption and decrypt the backup files using your private key. See Encrypt your backup files for more.

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Encryption is not mandatory

For each job, you may choose to only encrypt secrets, backup files or nothing. However we strongly advice you to encrypt both your credentials and backup files.