I am looking for a decent encryption program or a way to password protect a USB thumbdrive. I've never dealt with encryption before, so any guides or examples would be helpful.

There are quite a number of excellent USB flash drives that are designed for this, but encryption software for generic USB flash drives is trouble in the few systems I have seen... and there are too many ways to get around the encryption. Your unknown invader might not be able to get to your files... or if good, he might. But he can easily get rid of what is on the drive and use it as his own.

I'm not worried about it being formatted and used. I make weekly backups of it. I just don't want the information falling into the wrong hands.

there are techniques, BUT if you encrypt from system(A) and then move it to system(B), how will
you decrypt the data? you must have the same program or at least the same encryption standard
at the new location.

one thought is two primary folders; /ENC and /DATA. Inside ENC is the encryption program installer while /DATA contains data that gets encrypted.

you then rely upon the strength of the password mechanics for the encryption standard choosen.

btw: google for PGP tools

joebeard - That is exactly what I was thinking about. Partitioning the Thumbdrive to allow the program to be installed on a small partition,and keep the data on the remainder.

I'll have a look for PGP

THANKS!

What you want is TrueCrypt.

Video of its use and capabilities in Episode 191

oops! you store the INSTALLER in the /ENC partition and then use it
over & over to perform the install wherever you go

this means you need a shareware program w/o a license!