<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"> <html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> <head> <meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" /> <title>VeraCrypt - Free Open source disk encryption with strong security for the Paranoid</title> <meta name="description" content="VeraCrypt is free open-source disk encryption software for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux. In case an attacker forces you to reveal the password, VeraCrypt provides plausible deniability. In contrast to file encryption, data encryption performed by VeraCrypt is real-time (on-the-fly), automatic, transparent, needs very little memory, and does not involve temporary unencrypted files."/> <meta name="keywords" content="encryption, security"/> <link href="styles.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" /> </head> <body> <div> <a href="https://www.veracrypt.fr/en/Home.html"><img src="VeraCrypt128x128.png" alt="VeraCrypt"/></a> </div> <div id="menu"> <ul> <li><a href="Home.html">Home</a></li> <li><a href="/code/">Source Code</a></li> <li><a href="Downloads.html">Downloads</a></li> <li><a class="active" href="Documentation.html">Documentation</a></li> <li><a href="Donation.html">Donate</a></li> <li><a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/veracrypt/discussion/" target="_blank">Forums</a></li> </ul> </div> <div> <p> <a href="Documentation.html">Documentation</a> <img src="arrow_right.gif" alt=">>" style="margin-top: 5px"> <a href="Security%20Requirements%20and%20Precautions.html">Security Requirements and Precautions</a> <img src="arrow_right.gif" alt=">>" style="margin-top: 5px"> <a href="Volume%20Clones.html">Volume Clones</a> </p></div> <div class="wikidoc"> <div> <h2>Volume Clones</h2> <p>Never create a new VeraCrypt volume by cloning an existing VeraCrypt volume. Always use the VeraCrypt Volume Creation Wizard to create a new VeraCrypt volume. If you clone a volume and then start using both this volume and its clone in a way that both eventually contain different data, then you might aid cryptanalysis (both volumes will share a single key set). This is especially critical when the volume contains a hidden volume. Also note that plausible deniability (see section <a href="Plausible%20Deniability.html"><em>Plausible Deniability</em></a>) is impossible in such cases. See also the chapter <a href="How%20to%20Back%20Up%20Securely.html"> <em>How to Back Up Securely</em></a>.</p> </div> </div><div class="ClearBoth"></div></body></html>