How to safely back up the "Private" folder?

As it turns out, the .Private filesystem is ecryptfs, which contains a separate encrypted file for each item.

My solution is to backup the contents of ~/.Private (even though it is mounted at the time). The backup process should handle any changes in that folder gracefully since they are individual files.

• Logout from graphical desktop
• switch to text mode using CTRL-ALT-F1
• login as a different user with rights to access the encrypted files
• copy contents of the encrypted file folder to your network drive. I would recommend writing a short shell script which copies the files using rsync
• verify that you can mount and access the encrypted backup files

Reference: https://superuser.com/questions/227713/ecryptfs-how-to-mount-a-backup-of-an-encrypted-home-dir

You can use duplicity

• Securely gpg encrypted
• Supports ssh, ftp, webdav, amazon s3
• uses rsync (only changed files are sent in future backups)

Déjà Dup is a GUI frontend for duplicity. Make sure to check Encrypt backup files.