Hi Sterling Archer,To answer your question, the key file is a layer of security to be used in addition to your password. It massively increases the security of your Truecrypt partition. If you encrypt the hard disk on your computer using Truecrypt and keep the Keyfile on there, it will mean no one can access the Truecrypt partition except you.By all means use a container rather than a partition but you should do as you say and have a hidden volume with some hard porn/bank details in case you're compelled to hand over the password. As for having GPG4WIN / Bitcoin wallet I would suggest you encrypt your hard disk with Truecrypt as I said. There's a small risk that if your computer were seized that analysing the programs would compromise your identity.As far as GPG is concerned an analysis of your keyring would reveal your public and private keys. At the very least it would be possible to determine who you'd been in contact with. In the worst case if your private key was protected with a weak password it would be possible to decrypt e-mails to you!In terms of your Bitcoin client, it's true owning Bitcoins in itself isn't illegal but as the software contains the Bitcoin addresses you've been using it would be possible to trace the passage of any coins that have passed through your wallet.If you're going to set up a TC container, you might as well install Portable PGP / your Bitcoin wallet to there. Try to keep the size below 1GB so you can back up the container online.V.Quote from: SterlingArcher on April 26, 2012, 04:29 pmHey, Thanks for the quick reply.I was reading about key files before and thinking to myself that they seem less secure? clearly I'm wrong, but wouldnt having a key file on your computer be like having a password written down in the computer?And I was thinking because my spare hdd is 500gb and I dont need that sort of space to hold a few programs and passwords. could I just make a truecrypt container with a hidden container inside so that if I did ever get checked for it I could simply provide the wrong password and all theyll find is some porn or something? also does it matter if I have GPG4Win and my bitcoin wallet installed on the normal drives since they arent illegal programs anyway? or are they going to leave something behind?thanks