rvault is a secure and authenticated store for secrets (passwords, keys, certificates) and small documents. It uses envelope encryption with one-time password (OTP) authentication. The vault can be operated as a file system in userspace.

It is written in C11 and distributed under the 2-clause BSD license. Available on: Linux and MacOS.

Features

Key features and cryptography:

• Envelope encryption with one-time password (OTP) authentication.
• Mounting vault as a file system in userspace using FUSE.
• Command line interface (CLI) to operate secrets (and auto-complete for keys).
• scrypt RFC 7914 for the key derivation function (KDF).
• AES 256 or Chacha20 cipher with AE. ISO/IEC 19772:2009 compliant.
• Authentication with the server using TOTP (RFC 6238).
• On-the-fly LZ4 compression.

Lightweight code base, easy to audit, minimum dependencies, extensive tests, ASan and UBSan enabled, supports different CPU architectures.

Download

Download the latest packages from the releases page.

Usage

You need to run rvault svc, the server-side service, yourself.

Setup the vault and create the passphrase:

export RVAULT_SERVER="https://rvault.noxt.eu"
export RVAULT_PATH="/home/alice/vault"
mkdir "$RVAULT_PATH"
rvault create $UUID

Scan the QR code, e.g. using the Google Authenticator or Microsoft Authenticator. To mount the vault:

mkdir /home/alice/documents
rvault mount /home/alice/documents

Alternatively, you can create a vault without authentication (much less secure):

UUID=... # generate your own UUID
rvault create -n $UUID

Type rvault -h or see the rvault(1) manual page for more details.

FAQ

Would my data be stored or processed remotely?

No, all data is stored and managed locally. However, your envelope-encrypted key is sent and stored on a remote server. Because of the envelope encryption, your real encryption key is opaque to the server.

Can I access my data without Internet connectivity?

You need to authenticate with a remote server in order to access your data, therefore you need connectivity for that moment. You can work offline once authenticated.

What if my encrypted data and passphrase would get stolen?

It would still be insufficient to decrypt your data, unless the attacker actively hacks into your device and reads the key that is resident in-memory. However, such attack is much more sophisticated.

What if the remote server is hacked?

An attacker may retrieve the envelope-encrypted key, but it would still not be possible to decrypt the data without obtaining your data and passphrase.

The attacker, however, could destroy the keys stored on the server-side. Hence it is recommended to make a backup of the recovery key (which is the effective encryption key) for recovery and store it safely, e.g. print it on paper and lock it in a physical safe.

What if I lost my authentication device?

A new authentication device can be set up instead, once the user is verified using other reliable means (e.g. physical identification).

What if I would forget my passphrase?

It would be practically impossible to decrypt the data. However, if you made a backup of the recovery key, then you can recover your data.

Caveats

rvault is not designed to be efficient with large files or large quantities of data. The files are generally expected to fit in physical memory. The application sacrifices performance in favour of security, data integrity and simplicity.

Dependencies

Mandatory:

• OpenSSL (>= 1.1) or libsodium or mbed TLS (choose any)
• FUSE (libfuse and/or system support)
• libcurl

Optional:

• libedit
• sqlite3 3.23 or newer with SQLITE_ENABLE_DESERIALIZE enabled
• lz4

Building

To build from source:

• Regular build: cd src && make
• Debug build and running of tests: make clean && make debug

To build the packages:

• RPM (tested on RHEL/CentOS 8): cd pkg && make rpm
• DEB (tested on Debian 11): cd pkg && make deb
• MacOS pkg (tested on Catalina): cd pkg && make osx-pkg
• Experimental build on Windows/Cygwin: cd pkg && make win-pkg