Can I turn off FileVault 2 during encryption?

Hi, I started to use Filevault 2 in the mistaken belief that it would prevent anyone from accessing my data while I was online. I want to turn it off, but it is still in the process of encrypting the drive. Further, I'm worried that there might be insufficeint free space on the drive, and that the process might stall or fail.
Can I just turn off filevault int he preferences while it is still encrypting? Is this a safe thing to do?
TIA!

In OSX 10.8.3 (Mountian Lion), I found that I could interrupt the encryption process by opening the System Preferences Privacy & Security pane, selecting the FileVault Tab, clicking the lock to make changes and entering my password, and then selecting "Turn Off Firevault." At this point the encryption process was about an hour into an estimated 11-hour encryption stage.
The computer immediately responded by changing the displayed progress bar from showing encryption process progress to showing decryption process progress, and counted down to zero time for the next hour. After that, I rebooted and everything was normal, except that the setting for "Disable automatic login" was changed in the General tab of the same pane from unchecked to checked.
So, this is not a problem in my experience. It would be helpful if Apple made it more clear that this function FileVault) is really only useful if your computer is stolen (primarily a laptop issue) or access is attempted from the keyboard by an unauthorized user. It doesn't seem to prevent your files from being read by an invader within the main user account, for example by a virus or a Trojan.

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I had this issue with my Mac Pro. I needed to turn off Filevault because it was causing performance issues with my Adobe video editing software. I got the same message you did. It took some time, but I finally figured out how to solve the problem!! If you look in the console (Finder/Go/Utilities/Console) and go to the system log, you will be able to pinpoint what happened when the filevault failed to turn off. In my case, it was a few Firefox profile cahe files that were an issue (so I copied the profile folder to another disk, trashed the folder on my system drive, then emptied the trash). Then I tried again, and this time it was because of a few photos that were "locked". I unlocked the offending images and then tried once again and SUCCESS! I then replaced the Firefox profile folder to it's original location and everything is working like a charm. But most definately if people have "locked" folders or photos, Filevault will not be able to copy them and delete the encrypted version. I wish I had found a thread like this when I was going through my Filevault nightmare! Would have saved me a lot of trouble, worry and aggravation.
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If you don't already have a current backup of all data, back up before proceeding. There are ways to back up a computer that isn't fully functional. Ask if you need guidance.
Start up in Recovery mode. When the OS X Utilities screen appears, select Disk Utility.
In the Disk Utility window, select the icon of the startup volume from the list on the left. It will be nested below another disk icon, usually with the same name. Click the Unlock button in the toolbar. When prompted, enter the login password of a user authorized to unlock the volume, or the alternate decryption key that was generated when you activated FileVault.
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File ▹ Turn Off Encryption
Enter the password again.
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If you can't turn off encryption in Disk Utility because the menu item is grayed out, you'll have to erase the volume and then restore the data from a backup. Select the Erase tab, and then select
Mac OS Extended (Journaled)
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Advice Article TS1974 to create HD space to turn off FileVault doesn't work

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I have carefully followed instructions in the above article which falters at step 19, because the new Sparse Disk Image of my Home folder, created on an external HD, is 23GB in size and there is only 9Gb left on my resident laptop HD. This is precisely the problem the above procedure is supposed to get around!
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As an aside I've discovered a couple of errors/omissions in the above article. I'd be pleased to list them for our moderator if considered helpful for others.
Please can anyone help me understand:
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2. How can I copy my new Home Directory back to a nearly full HD without first deleting the original account?
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I'm not sure about the instructions in [Apple support article TS1974|http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1974?viewlocale=en_US] , but here are some thoughts.
That support article includes
When turning FireVault on or off in Security preferences in Mac OS X 10.4 or later, this alert may appear:
"There isn't enough space on your hard disk to turn on (or off) FileVault"
The amount of free space stated as needed may be much greater than what is available ("4000 GB of free space is needed" may appear, for example).
There can't really be "4000 GB" of free space needed, and so if you see that message it may instead indicate some system error. If that is the case then there might actually BE enough free space on the HD, and it may be that situation that the support article is trying to remedy. The method given, which doesn't delete the old FV data before importing the new data, doesn't otherwise make sense, as you say.
In your case, where there really isn't enough free space, I also would instead try cloning to a bigger drive. The idea would be to clone your entire internal HD to a larger external volume, boot from it, turn off FileVault from there, and then test everything thoroughly. If all functions well on the external volume with Filevault off, then you would clone it back to the internal HD. This has the advantage of not deleting anything on your internal HD until you are sure that the clone works properly.
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Working with FileVault home directories
FileVault protects the contents of your home directory by enclosing it in an encrypted disk image. When you log in, the encrypted disk image is unlocked via your login and password and mounted for use as your home directory. Mounted disk images pose an interesting problem to incremental backup utilities. By simply being mounted and accessed (e.g. via browsing the contents), the content of a disk image, and thus the disk image file itself, is modified. If you run CCC while logged in to a FileVault-protected account, there is a strong chance that the FileVault disk image will be modified while it is being backed up, resulting in a corrupted version of the disk image on your backup volume. Also, because the contents of your FileVault-protected home directory are technically on another volume, CCC will not back up the contents of your home directory when backing up your root filesystem (e.g. your boot drive).
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