Ecosyste.ms: Awesome

An open API service indexing awesome lists of open source software.

Awesome Lists | Featured Topics | Projects

https://github.com/aarant/nescient

Store, encrypt and decrypt files to and from encrypted, authenticated containers.
https://github.com/aarant/nescient

cryptography encryption-tool python python3

Last synced: 23 days ago
JSON representation

Store, encrypt and decrypt files to and from encrypted, authenticated containers.

Awesome Lists containing this project

README 

        
.. |pypi| image:: https://img.shields.io/pypi/v/nescient.svg

.. _pypi: https://pypi.python.org/pypi/Nescient

.. |license| image:: https://img.shields.io/github/license/arantonitis/nescient.svg

.. _license: https://github.com/arantonitis/nescient/tree/master/LICENSE

.. |travis| image:: https://travis-ci.org/arantonitis/nescient.svg?branch=master

.. _travis: https://travis-ci.org/arantonitis/nescient/

.. |appveyor| image:: https://ci.appveyor.com/api/projects/status/r5p0hg36srwi2k06?svg=true

.. _appveyor: https://ci.appveyor.com/project/arantonitis/nescient

.. |nessie| image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/arantonitis/nescient/master/nescient/nessie.png

   :height: 64px

   :width: 64px

   :align: middle

   :alt:



|nessie| Nescient

*****************

|pypi|_ |license|_ |travis|_ |appveyor|_



*nescient, n. (nesh-int) - from Latin 'unknowing', 'hidden'*  



Store, encrypt and decrypt files to and from encrypted, authenticated containers.



Nescient provides an easy-to-use, secure, and efficient means of file or memory level encryption.



Several use cases include:



* Backing up multiple files to a reliable yet insecure location.



* Providing additional, file-level encryption to supplement full disk encryption, securing packed files even while the machine is on with the disk-level encryption key loaded in memory.



* Sharing files with others securely, by transferring a Nescient container through an insecure channel and providing a password through a separate secure channel.



* Using Nescient's cryptographic classes to efficiently implement secure protocols.



Nescient is:



* **open source**: It is licensed under the permissive MIT license.



* **multiplatform**: As a Python project, Nescient works on all the major operating systems (Windows, macOS, and Linux)



* **transparent**: The means with which Nescient encrypts and packs files is documented, and the algorithms used are tested both against official test vectors and arbitrary data to ensure correctness.



* **fast**: All core crypto code is written in Cython and compiled to C extensions, making it fast enough to be practically usable for large files. The fastest cipher modes achieve speeds of 10 cycles/byte.



Nescient supports the following packing modes:



* The AES block cipher for encryption, with either 128, 192, or 256 bit keys, in CBC mode, and SHA-256 for generating authentication tags.



* The ChaCha20 stream cipher with 256 bit keys and SHA-256 for generating authentication tags.



Installation

============



Windows

-------

Nescient is available as a pre-packaged, standalone Windows executable, downloadable from the `github releases`_. The executable can be used in GUI-mode, by double-clicking, or can be run with command line arguments.



From PyPI

---------

Nescient requires Python 3.4 or later.



Windows users installing Nescient as a Python package are **strongly suggested** to have a 64-bit Python installation on their machines. Otherwise, installation may require installing the Microsoft C++ Visual Build Tools to compile Nescient's C extensions.



Install Nescient from the Python Package Index (PyPI) by running ``pip install nescient``.



.. note::



   * On most Linux systems, installation may require running pip with root permissions, or running ``pip install nescient --user`` instead.

   

   * On most Linux systems, there may be two versions of pip available: The Python 3 version is typically called ``pip3``.

   

From Releases

-------------

An arbitrary stable (not development) release can be installed from the `github releases`_ by downloading the zip archive and running ``pip install .tar.gz

   

Installing from source may require installing compilation tools.



.. _github releases: https://github.com/arantonitis/nescient/releases

.. _git repo: https://github.com/arantonitis/nescient



Usage

=====

Nescient has a GUI mode, which can be run by simply running ``nescient-ui``, or ``nescient`` with no arguments.



Nescient can pack or unpack files into/from ``.nesc`` containers. Some typical usage might be:



``nescient pack file1 file2``



``nescient unpack file1.nesc``



Unless otherwise specified via command line flags, Nescient packs and unpacks files in place, overwriting their data.



Command line help can be viewed with ``nescient -h``.



Development

===========

Nescient versioning functions on a ``MAJOR.MINOR.PATCH.[DEVELOP]`` model. Only stable, non development releases will be published to PyPI. Because Nescient is still a beta project, the ``MAJOR`` increment will be 0. Minor increments represent new features. Patch increments represent problems fixed with existing features.



Planned features include:



* New cipher modes for existing algorithms, like the GCM authenticated mode, and additional encryption algorithms.



* Integrated compression when packing files.



* GUI mode enhancements.



* Documentation.