-The need for an efficient, secure, accurate, reliable way of securing user information arises as individuals and organizations increase their dependency on cloud computing. Data encryption is very important nowadays due to increasing in data theft not only on cloud platform but also on user's computer. For this study, 3 different Open Source encryption software's (7-zip, B1 Free Archiver and Axcrypt) were tested for their encryption type, usability, advantages, accessibility and others, all of which were found to be using AES 256-bit Algorithm for encryption due to its reliability. 7 zip is the most preferred encryption program due to its wide availability, light weight, faster encryption and better compression ratio. To ensure the security of information, encryption of sensitive data not only to be uploaded to the cloud but also on user's computer becomes necessary.
INTRODUCTION
The delivery of computing services across the globe is
cloud computing [
A common reoccurring word in cloud computing is the
internet. The Internet is a mechanism for information
dissemination, and a medium for collaboration and
interaction between individuals and their computers without
regard for the geographic location [
It is a worldwide system of unified networks of computer
that use the(TCP/IP) that is internet protocol suite to join
billions of devices worldwide, consisting of millions of
academic, private, business, public, and government
networks of local to global scope, coupled with a wide array
of wireless, optical networking technologies and electronic
devices [
In cloud, privacy and security of personal information is
very important. Often in another country, personal
information is turned over to another organization making it
unsecured. It is essential to ensure that data is only accessed
by the authorized user to overcome the high level of
insecurity [
The complexity and cost of operating and owning computers and networks is significantly reduced when using cloud computing. For example If an individual or company uses a cloud services, less money is needed and spent on buying software licenses or hardware or even information technology infrastructure
One of the major cloud service providers Microsoft is
committed to providing a cloud you can trust. They believe
there are five critical areas you need to know about when
talking about cloud security [
Several literatures have proposed various method of ensuring the security of data in cloud such as authentication, accesses controls and cryptography among others which are mostly enforced either by third parties or service providers. The paper proposed a technique of securing files on cloud using encryption program by suggesting the best amongst the three presented based on the comparison made.
The paper is structured in the following manner. The first segment is the introduction which contained motivation, aim, objectives, scope and limitation of the research. The next segment reviewed several literatures that are related to the subject matter in details. In Section III, methodology used in evaluating and testing the software’s is discussed. The main activities involved in evaluating the three (3) selected progra m and a comparative analysis of the selected programs were explored in Section IV. Finally, the paper is completed with the succeeding segment.
Dropbox and Microsoft with new once coming up every now and then. Every of these cloud providers come with its own kind of services and different security technologies that strive to convince the customer of it been the best either way.
It will be wiser if the security of information is placed more in the hands of the owner as this go along to install and improve the confidence level in cloud security and data integrity since the only person that can easily access information on the cloud must be the same person that puts them or any other party granted access by the owner of the information. Hence, the motivation for this research came as result of the increasing need to have more effective way for securing data on the cloud to keep it away from data theft.
The aim of this research is to implement and test different encryption software platforms and select the one's that will be best suited to use in securing files on the cloud technology. The objectives of the study include to: Test for different software encryption (Types/ parameters). Employ the use of some encryption software's and implement a means of ensuring security by allowing access to file using password encryption setup by the information owner so that the integrity of the outsourced data is not compromised on the cloud. Compare the encryption software's and ascertain the area that is best suited for securing files on the cloud
The research covers implementation of some encryption software. Cloud computing system is an internet based application, which makes its accessible from every corner of the world. The research will provide standard and guidelines for the cloud service providers and as well as cloud users.
II.
LITERATURE REVIEW
The idea behind a centralized computing began as far
back as the 1960s, when mainframe time-sharing technology
was the computing services provided across a network. At
exactly 1966, a book titled "The Challenge of the Computer
Utility" was put out by a Canadian engineer Douglass
Parkhill, which traces the idea of computing as a public
utility with a centralized computing facility to which many
remote users connect over networks [
In the 1960s, computing resources were efficiently used by the mainframe time-sharing method and offered acceptable performance to users; As a result of increasingly high hardware costs mainframes were hard to provision upfront and scale. Therefore, users didn’t have full power over the performance of mainframe applications as it depended on how many users used the mainframe at a given moment. Thus, with the preface of personal computers users prefer to have absolute power over their computing resources, even although these resources are not efficiently used.
Personal computers became affordable and business deserted mainframes with the change in the semiconductor industry. The challenge of how to share data was then introduced. Client-server systems were believed to tackle this data-sharing challenge through the means of providing centralized data management and processing servers. As the Internet became widely adopted and business computing needs grew, the original simple client-server architecture changed into more compound architectures. Thus, the complexity and the management costs of IT have passed even the costs of real software development in big organizations are typically lesser than infrastructure maintenance and costs of the software.
The dream of numerous enterprises is the background information technology matters and how to focus on core business instead. However, the result of the cloud computing acceptance is yet to be pictured, many companies think that cloud computing may present a feasible alternative model that may cut costs and complexity whereas escalating operational competence.
The Cloud is a computing platform that depends on the
internet for availability and accessibility [
B. Cloud Computing
[
The set of control-based policies and technologies are
designed to protect and adhere to regulatory compliance rule
in other to enforce overall security in cloud computing, it
usage is associated with infrastructure and data applications
[
The most challenging obstacle to the acceptance of cloud is the security of data. Data is most valuable asset, individuals and organizations are really concern to know the status of their data. That is whether the data is safe or not.
When data are stored internally, individuals, companies,
and government are rest assured of its security as they handle
the overall control. Even though no warranty that data is
more confined within when compared with the public cloud.
The public cloud might be even more secured in storing data
due to the fact that the providers of these services may
implement advance level of security. Various methods of
protecting data in the cloud have been implemented but full
protection of data cannot be assured. The following are some
of the resent techniques proposed by different authors.
A secure and efficient auditing scheme was developed by
[
[
Two separate algorithms namely symmetric key
cryptographic and message authentication code (MAC)
generation and was introduced by [
[
[
According to [
[
[
[
The proposed scheme provides client-side security measure that can be taken to guarantee the information stored in the cloud. The proposal uses the cryptographic techniques of encryption using Diffie-Hellman algorithms and Advanced Encryption Standard (AES). AES was used to encipher the data before uploading to the cloud while DiffieHellman algorithm was employed to generate the key pair.
III.
METHODOLOGY
This chapter looked into procedures for testing and evaluating the softwares under consideration. These procedures follow a systematically structured approach to effectively understand and provide techniques for the usability and the advantages of the softwares by comparing all standards.
The following software’s were used to conduct the research: 7zip B1 Free Archiver AxCrypt
These software were selected based on ranking and accessibility offering open source license.
The 7zip was developed by Igor Pavlov 1999. It is an open-source file archiver, an application primarily used to compress files. Also uses its own 7z archive format, but can read and write several other archive formats. The program can be used from a command-line interface, graphical user interface and with window-based shell integration. The cross-platform version of the command line utility 7zip is also available.
B1 Free Archiver is a free multiplatform compression tool and an open-source software project that produces a cross-platform command-line tool and a Java library for creating and extracting file archives in the B1 archive format.
AxCrypt is an efficient, simple, free open source, and easy to use encryption tool. It is a GNU GPL-licensed program for windows which integrates properly with the windows shell. The tool locked a file for a certain period of time and later decrypt itself or if the intended receiver obtained it. AxCrypt proffers security against brute force cracking attempts with a lightweight less than 1MB and supports 128-bit AES encryption only.
The following are considered in the implementation of the software.
Software Encryption Type/Parameters.
Use of Password protection on files.
Easy Implementation procedures.
Comparing the three Softwares and ascertaining the most suitable depending on user need.
The following are the system hardware requirements A computer system (either desktop or laptop) Processor of any kind e.g. Intel Pentium 4. 1GB RAM and above. At least 200mb Installation Space Keyboard. Mouse. Internet Access
IV.
TEST AND EVALUATION
This section deals with the main activities involved in
evaluating the three (3) selected programs for the study. The
programs were selected due to wide availability, simplicity,
and accessibility. System testing involves any activity aimed
at evaluating an attribute or capability of a program or
system and determining that it meets its required results [
For this study, we made use of Microsoft Windows 7 Professional Edition was used as the OS and a computer system with the following Hardware configurations.
The Table I shows basic information of the system used during testing and evaluation of the programs. All the programs performed excellently well with no known compatibility issues with the Operating System.
Table II shows that all software's require little space for installation with the highest file size requirement were 140mb.
The table II shows comparative analysis of the 3 selected program based on File Size (64 Bit Installer), File Size after installation on system, open source, version/release date, encryption algorithm, OS compatibility, license, command line interface, self extractor, unlock other encryption, compression ration window Context Menu Integration and Registration.
The study revealed that 7 Zip is a lightweight application with just 1.31 megabytes (MB) of installation file size in a 64-bit version. It is the most compatible with all the three application used during this research with wide support for almost all common operating systems (windows, Linux, FreeBSD, Mac Os, Solaris and Aix among others). It is an opens source application under the Great New Utility (GNU) and Lesser General Public License (LGPL); therefore 7-Zip can be used on any computer, including a computer in a commercial organization. 7zip support 256bit AES Encryption Algorithm which is still currently unbreakable except using brute force attack which is only easy and possible if password set is not strong enough. i.e using only small length numbers and alphabets with no capitalization and other characters as a password. Even after installing the software the file size is still comparatively smaller than the others. 7zip support self-extraction this implies that a zip file can be created using 7zip that can extract itself without needing any zip manager or 7-zip been installed preinstalled on the system. It is the only one amongst them that support this feature. Some computer hardware vendors install 7zip on their machine during factory installation showcasing its wide acceptance and usability. For software developers and command line gigs 7 zip support command line interface which can be easily integrated into other software for usability within the software's and also since it is an open source, developers are free to lookup the source code to add, modify and make the application better and more suitable for the purpose they require it to perform. It integrates very well with windows operating system and provides easy access through the windows context menu. 7zip can be easily downloaded from the website and has basic windows installation requirement to install. Figure 1 shows a graphical representation of 7zip download website.
Download website: http://www.7-zip.org/download.html
The software requires a very simple installation process. When running the installer, is run, it simply pops up an installer windows with the default Program file directory where the software is going to be installed to, alternatively, the default directory if so desired during the installation process.
The graphical representation on Figure 2 is been labeled with a number to provide the reader with easy reference to the part of the program been explained. This allows the reader pictorial and graphical representation of the program which foster easy comprehension and retention. Though bearing in mind the most important part of the research (encryption), effective use the software from the interface is performed the following after running the software.
Navigate to the Directory where the file to be Encrypted resides.
Select the File or Files to be Encrypted Click on the Add Button (A new Popup window appears showing you all the possible Encryption parameter possible on the software).
This represents the encryption parameters that can be choosing, for the purpose of the default parameters provided by the system was used. 7z extension is the default file type for 7zip Archive/Encryption, the extension changes when another Archive format is selected (.zip .tar .gzip and others), every of which has its drawback and advantage. Also, the extension file can be .exe telling you option 7 from the graphic is selected representing Self-Extracting Archive (SFX). SFX are archives that can extract themselves without requiring any preinstalled archive or extraction software.
This is the most important aspect of the Encryption were password is set to protect the archive from unauthorized access. Without this option been setup, the archive is just a normal archive that can be easily accessed by anyone. Around it, a select box that shows the kind of Encryption system been used (AES 256) which till date is one of the strongest encryption system known.
This provides option for SFX as earlier discussed in number 5.
After everything is setup and looking ok. This option commits the selection and proceeds with the archiving. The archived file is by default placed in the same directory as the navigated directory in 1, except if new directory is re-specified by the user.
Below are procedures of Creating an Archive (Encryption from the Windows Context Menu). The contexts menu provides a fast and easy way of creating Encrypted Archive.
Right-click on the desired file/files, folder/folders or a combination of both to be encrypted.
Select the 7-zip option on the context menu to display other options
Click on "Add to Archive" to pop up the Encryption option as earlier covered. If basic Archive requires without encryption quickly do that by selecting add to (Filename).7z" or "(Filename).zip".
source code to add, modify and make the application better and more suitable for the purpose they require it to perform. It integrates very well with windows operating system and provides easy access through the windows context menu. Below represents a graphical presentation of the software.
If 7zip is setup as the default zip managing software then you can see a file type like the one labeled 1 on the figure 4. 7zip Archived file 7-zip SFX file Right click on the file or files you wish to extract and scroll down to 7-zip and select Select the option most suitable to you. Open Archive, Extract Files..., Extract Files Here all pops up a new window demanding for password used in setting up the Encrypted Archive file. Insert the Passphrase used in encrypting the file Select ok to begin file extraction.
Alternatively, file from 7-zip application menu can also be selected by selecting the desired file to be extracted and clicking on the extract button from the menu. For further guidance and instruction, the help files by selecting help from the file menu then click on content.
B1 Free Archiver compared with other programs used for
this study and commonly known encryption software, B1
free Archiver is large with an approximate file size of 44.55
MB. It is the second most compatible software with support
for four common most used OS (windows, Linux, Mac Os
and Android). It is also an Opens Source Application under
the GNU LGPL license, which makes it accessibility span
over both private and public usage. It supports 256bit AES
Encryption Algorithm which according to [
Figure 5 depicts how B1 free Archive is used to create secured encrypted file after running the program.
Address Bar shows the Address of the current working folder, if the need arises, easy navigation to the desired folder the files to be encrypted reside. Select file/Files intended to archive. This is a preview page used to preview your files, though, limited to only certain file types Create Button used to create the Encrypted file after the selection process.
This is where the location of the Output destination is set and also file name of the Encrypted file. By Default it is set to the destination of the selected file/files for Encryption and the name of the file if single or the name of the folder if multiple.
This is the option used to select the type of archive to be created. by Default .B1 is selected which cannot be opened by any other known program except B1 which provides it with another layer of security.
This option allows you add Encryption to the Archive.
After all, parameters are well inserted you then proceed by clicking this button to commit changes. If a password is inserted, a confirmation dialogue pops up to confirm the password and to prevent mistakes.
The following are the procedure in extracting file from the context menu: Right-click on the desired file to be extracted. Select Extract Here from the context menu and the extracted files to be in the same Directory as the one are currently working on else are selected. Select “Extract to” for other options to populate describing where and how the downloaded files will be. A pop-up window appears asking to input the password used during the encryption before the extraction will begin.
B1 Free Archiver supports numerous archive file format and can be used for common Archive management alone that is (.B1, .zip, .gzip, others).
V.
DISCUSSION
Nowadays information theft and ransomware are the
leading threat to computer and digital data. It is believed that
all cloud provider put in an extra effort to see that
information stored with them are adequately secured and free
from prying eyes. Although, that has not been able to totally
prevent information theft and privacy intrusions. Some
information gets into the wrong hands through malware
installed on target computers [
7-zip is lightweight with little memory requirement and is compatible with most archive formats. It has a very high compression ratio with a simple to use user interface. B1 free Archive is very easy to use and with a very appealing graphical interface. It is simple flexible and supports numerous file extensions also with a B1 format that can only be extracted using the software itself.
When storing or would like to store your files in the cloud, make sure they are securely encrypted before uploading them to the cloud. Encrypting your files will safeguard the privacy of your data, which is especially important when storing sensitive corporate data or personal information that should never fall into the wrong hands.
SUMMARY, CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS
Encrypting files before been sent through any media or stored by the owner of the document is currently the best way of preventing unauthorized access to files. Cloud Computing offers enormous benefits to user in terms of file accessibility from any part of the world but has its limitations mostly in the area of Security. The most challenging obstacle to the acceptance of cloud is the security of data. Data is most valuable asset, individuals and organizations are really concern to know the status of their data. That is whether the data is safe or not.
When data are stored internally, individuals, companies, and government are rest assured of its security as they handle the overall control. Even though no warranty that data is more confined within when compared with the public cloud. The public cloud might be even more secured in storing data due to the fact that the providers of these services may implement advance level of security. Various methods of protecting data in the cloud have been implemented but full protection of data cannot be assured. Therefore the best way of securing files even on user’s computer is by Encrypting sensitive information.
7-zip, B1 Free File Archive, and Axcrypt all provide secure encryption mechanism using AES 256-bit algorithm to effectively encrypt files. AES 256-bit algorithm currently has no proven record of crackability, which means any file encrypted with AES 256-bit is secure and cannot be accessed except by using the correct password set during encryption.
7zip support self-extraction this implies that a zip file can be created using 7zip that can extract itself without needing any zip manager or 7-zip been installed preinstalled on the system. It is the only one amongst them that support this feature. Some computer hardware vendors install 7zip on their machine during factory installation showcasing its wide acceptance and usability
Data encryption is very important nowadays due to increasing in data theft and independence on cloud platforms. The research work presents securing file on cloud computing system using encryption software: a comparative analysis.The encryption programs are 7zip, B1 free acrhiver and Axcrpt which are been compared on varieties of paramiters. The result have revealed that among the encryption softawares, 7zip work better due to its wide availability, light weight, faster encryption and better compression ratio when compared to the others.
File Encryption provides an efficient, secure, accurate, reliable way of securing sensitive information both on user computer and cloud. Companies and individuals should put in time and efforts to ensure that sensitive information is well encrypted to prevent unauthorized access. The following recommendations are proffered.
Encrypting sensitive files and information before been uploaded to the cloud. Using a combination of alphabets, numbers and characters as Encryption password to reduce the possibility of brute force attack.
Design and implementation of encryption programs that is back to back compatible with all cloud service providers from the client's end.
Implementing password strengthening parameters when setting up a password to ensure the user sees the strength of the password been set.