Restic 0.17.3 brings zero-trust backups to Ubuntu 24.04

Restic 0.17.3 includes native client-side AES-256-CTR encryption and Ubuntu 24.04 packages [DevTo]. A step-by-step guide on Dev.to outlines setting up zero-trust backups. The guide uses Restic 0.17.3, downloaded from the official GitHub release, and installed to /usr/local/bin. It creates a systemd service running a one-shot restic backup command and a matching timer triggering daily at 02:00 UTC with a 30-minute jitter [DevTo]. The service uses an environment file storing an S3 repository URL, a strong passphrase, and IAM credentials scoped to append-only access for the locks/ prefix while denying DeleteObject on data/, index/, and snapshots/. This configuration prevents accidental execution on reboot by disabling the [Install] block in the service file. Restic's client-side encryption eliminates plaintext exposure, as every chunk is encrypted before leaving the host [DevTo]. Content-defined chunking reduces storage and bandwidth costs by deduplicating at the block level. Strict IAM policies prevent ransomware wipeouts by limiting delete permissions to the locks/ prefix. Hard-coding the Restic version avoids GitHub rate-limit crashes, which would otherwise break large-scale deployments [DevTo].