Encryption Configuration¶
The primary purpose of the ownCloud server-side encryption is to protect users’ files located on a remote storage, such as Dropbox and Google Drive, and to do it smoothly and seamlessly from within ownCloud.
In ownCloud 9.0 server-side encryption separates the encryption of local and remote storage. Doing so allows you to encrypt files on remote storage, such as Dropbox and Google, without also having to encrypt your home storage on your ownCloud server.
Note
Starting with ownCloud 9.0 we support authenticated encryption for all newly encrypted files. See https://hackerone.com/reports/108082 for more technical information about the impact.
For maximum security make sure to enable “Check for changes: Never.” when configuring external storage. With it enabled, ownCloud ignores new files not added via ownCloud, and a malicious external storage administrator could not add new files to the storage without your knowledge. Of course, this is not wise if your external storage is subject to legitimate external changes.
Encryption and decryption are performed on the ownCloud server. ownCloud server-side encryption encrypts files stored on the ownCloud server and files on remote storage that are connected to your ownCloud server. All files stored on remote storages will be decrypted upon retrieval, before serving them to you and anyone you have shared them with.
Note
Encrypting files increases their size by roughly 35%, so you must take this into account when you are provisioning storage and setting storage quotas. User’s quotas are based on the unencrypted file size, and not the encrypted file size.
When files on external storage are encrypted in ownCloud, you cannot share them directly from the external storage services, only through ownCloud sharing, because the key to decrypt the data never leaves the ownCloud server.
ownCloud’s server-side encryption generates a strong encryption key, which is unlocked by the user’s passwords. Your users don’t need to track an extra password, just log in as they normally do. It encrypts only the contents of files, and not filenames and directory structures.
Important
You should regularly backup all encryption keys to prevent permanent data loss.
The encryption keys are stored in the following directories:
Directory | Description |
---|---|
data/<user>/files_encryption |
Users’ private keys and all other keys necessary to decrypt the users’ files. |
data/files_encryption |
Private keys and all other keys necessary to decrypt the files stored on a system wide external storage. |
Note
You can move the keys to a different location. To do so, refer to the Move Key Location section of the documentation.
When encryption is enabled, all files are encrypted and decrypted by the ownCloud application, and stored encrypted on your remote storage. This protects your data on externally hosted storage. The ownCloud admin and the storage admin will see only encrypted files when browsing backend storage.
Warning
Encryption keys are stored only on the ownCloud server, eliminating exposure of your data to third-party storage providers. The encryption application does not protect your data if your ownCloud server is compromised, and it does not prevent ownCloud administrators from reading users’ files. This would require client-side encryption, which this application does not provide. If your ownCloud server is not connected to any external storage services, it is better to use other encryption tools, such as file-level or whole-disk encryption.
Important
SSL terminates at or before Apache on the ownCloud server. Consequently, all files are in an unencrypted state between the SSL connection termination and the ownCloud code that encrypts and decrypts them. This is, potentially, exploitable by anyone with administrator access to your server. For more information, read: How ownCloud uses encryption to protect your data.
Before Enabling Encryption¶
Plan very carefully before enabling encryption, because it is not reversible via the ownCloud Web interface.
If you lose your encryption keys, your files are not recoverable.
Always have backups of your encryption keys stored in a safe location, and consider enabling all recovery options.
You have more options via the occ
command (see How To Change The Recovery Key Password)
How To Enable Encryption¶
The base encryption system is enabled and disabled on your Admin page. First, you must enable this, and then select an encryption module to load. Go to the Server-side encryption section of your Admin page and check Enable encryption.

After clicking Enable encryption, you will see the message “No encryption module loaded, please load an encryption module in the app menu”. Currently, the only available encryption module is the ownCloud Default Encryption module. So, go to your Apps page to enable the ownCloud Default Encryption module.

Then, return to your Admin page to see that the ownCloud Default Encryption module has been added to the module selector and automatically selected. Now you must log out and then log back in to initialize your encryption keys.

When you log back in, a checkbox for enabling encryption on your home storage, will now be available — checked by default. Uncheck it to avoid encrypting your home storage.

Enabling Encryption From the Command-line¶
To enable encryption via the command-line, involves two commands. These are:
# Enables the default encryption module app
php occ app:enable encryption
# Enables encryption
php occ encryption:enable
Note
Please note, the commands have to be run in this order.
Enabling Master Key Based Encryption¶
To enable master key based encryption:
- Enable the default encryption module app, using the following command:
php occ app:enable encryption
- Then enable encryption, using the following command
php occ encryption:enable
- Then enable the master key, using the following command:
php occ encryption:enable-master-key
Note
When LDAP is configured with a User Home Folder Naming Rule encryption does have some issues. This is a known bug and we are working hard on resolving this issue.
How To Encrypt External Mountpoints¶
You and your users can encrypt individual external mount points. You must have external storage enabled on your Admin page and enabled for your users. Encryption settings can be configured in the mount options for an external storage mount, see Mount Options (Configuring External Storage (GUI))
How To Enable Users File Recovery Keys¶
If you lose your ownCloud password, then you lose access to your encrypted files. If one of your users loses their ownCloud password, their files are unrecoverable. You cannot reset their password in the normal way. Instead, you’ll see a yellow banner warning: “Please provide an admin recovery password, otherwise all user data will be lost”.
To avoid all this, make sure you create a recovery key. To do so, go to the Encryption section of your Admin page, where you can set one.

When you do this, your users will have the option of enabling password recovery on their personal pages. If they do not do this, then the recovery key won’t work for them.

For users who have enabled password recovery, give them a new password and recover access to their encrypted files by supplying the recovery key on the Users page.

You may change your recovery key password.

How To Change The Recovery Key Password¶
If you misplace your recovery key password, follow these steps to delete the old recovery share keys and encrypt your files with a new recovery key:
- Delete the recovery key from both
data/owncloud_private_keys
and ``data/public-keys’‘ - Edit the table
oc_appconfig
and remove the rows with the config keys:recoveryKeyId
andrecoveryAdminEnabled
for the appid:files_encryption
- Login as admin and activate the recovery key again with a new password. This will generate a new key pair
- All users who used the original recovery key will need to disable it and enable it again
Note
You can only change the recovery key password if you know the original. This is by design, as only admins who know the recovery key password should be able to change it. If not, admins could hijack the recovery key from each other
Warning
Replacing the recovery key will mean that all users will lose the possibility to recover their files until they have applied the new recovery key
Disabling Encryption¶
To disable encryption, put your ownCloud server into single-user mode, and then disable your encryption module with these commands:
occ maintenance:singleuser --on
occ encryption:disable
Take it out of single-user mode when you are finished, by using the following command:
occ maintenance:singleuser --off
Important
You may only disable encryption with by using the occ Encryption Commands. Make sure you have backups of all encryption keys, including those for all your users.
Not All Files Are Encrypted¶
Only the data in the files in data/user/files
are encrypted, not the filenames or folder structures.
In addition, these files are never encrypted:
- Existing files in the trash bin & Versions. Only new and changed files after encryption is enabled are encrypted.
- Image thumbnails from the Gallery app
- Previews from the Files app
- The search index from the full-text search app
- Third-party app data
There may be other files that are not encrypted. Only files that are exposed to third-party storage providers are guaranteed to be encrypted.
LDAP and Other External User Back-ends¶
If you use an external user back-end, such as an LDAP or Samba server, and you change a user’s password on that back-end, the user will be prompted to change their ownCloud login to match on their next ownCloud login. The user will need both their old and new passwords to do this. If you have enabled the recovery key then you can change a user’s password in the ownCloud Users panel to match their back-end password and then — of course — notify the user and give them their new password.
occ Encryption Commands¶
If you have shell access, you may use the occ
command to perform encryption
operations, and you have additional options such as decryption and creating a
single master encryption key.
See Encryption for detailed instructions on using occ
.
Get the current status of encryption and the loaded encryption module:
occ encryption:status
- enabled: false
- defaultModule: OC_DEFAULT_MODULE
This is equivalent to checking Enable server-side encryption on your Admin page:
occ encryption:enable
Encryption enabled
Default module: OC_DEFAULT_MODULE
List the available encryption modules:
occ encryption:list-modules
- OC_DEFAULT_MODULE: Default encryption module [default*]
Select a different default Encryption module (currently the only available module is OC_DEFAULT_MODULE):
occ encryption:set-default-module [Module ID].
The [module ID] is taken from the encryption:list-modules
command.
Encrypt all data files for all users.
For performance reasons, when you enable encryption on an ownCloud server only new and changed files are encrypted.
This command gives you the option to encrypt all files.
You must first put your ownCloud server into single-user mode to prevent any user activity until encryption is completed:
occ maintenance:singleuser
Single user mode is currently enabled
Then run occ
:
occ encryption:encrypt-all
You are about to start to encrypt all files stored in your ownCloud.
It will depend on the encryption module you use which files get encrypted.
Depending on the number and size of your files this can take some time.
Please make sure that no users access their files during this process!
Do you really want to continue? (y/n)
When you type y
it creates a key pair for each of your users, and then encrypts their files, displaying progress until all user files are encrypted.
Decrypt all user data files, or optionally a single user:
occ encryption:decrypt-all [username]
View current location of keys:
occ encryption:show-key-storage-root
Current key storage root: default storage location (data/)
Move Key Location¶
Move keys to a different root folder, either locally or on a different server.
The folder must already exist, be owned by root and your HTTP group, and be restricted to root and your HTTP group.
This example is for Ubuntu Linux.
Note that the new folder is relative to your occ
directory:
mkdir /etc/keys
chown -R root:www-data /etc/keys
chmod -R 0770 /etc/keys
occ encryption:change-key-storage-root ../../../etc/keys
Start to move keys:
4 [============================]
Key storage root successfully changed to ../../../etc/keys
Create a new master key. Use this when you have a single-sign-on infrastructure. Use this only on fresh installations with no existing data, or on systems where encryption has not already been enabled. It is not possible to disable it:
occ encryption:enable-master-key
Encryption migration to ownCloud 8.0¶
When you upgrade from older versions of ownCloud to ownCloud 8.0, you must manually migrate your encryption keys with the occ command after the upgrade is complete, like this example for CentOS: sudo -u apache php occ encryption:migrate-keys. You must run occ as your HTTP user. See Using the occ Command to learn more about occ.
Encryption migration to ownCloud 8.1¶
The encryption backend has changed again in ownCloud 8.1, so you must take some additional steps to migrate encryption correctly. If you do not follow these steps you may not be able to access your files.
Before you start your upgrade, put your ownCloud server into maintenance:singleuser
mode (See Maintenance Mode Configuration.)
You must do this to prevent users and sync clients from accessing files before you have completed your encryption migration.
After your upgrade is complete, follow the steps in How To Enable Encryption to
enable the new encryption system.
Then, click the Start Migration button on your Admin page to migrate your encryption keys, or use the occ
command.
We strongly recommend using the occ
command; the Start Migration button is for admins who do not have access to the console, for example, installations on shared hosting.
This example is for Debian/Ubuntu Linux:
$ sudo -u www-data php occ encryption:migrate
This example is for Red Hat/CentOS/Fedora Linux:
$ sudo -u apache php occ encryption:migrate
You must run occ
as your HTTP user; see
Using the occ Command.
When you are finished, take your ownCloud server out of
maintenance:singleuser
mode.