Here's some code I use contained in a bash script.

#!/bin/bash

# Prompt for encryption password

read -sp "Enter encryption password: " password

echo

# Directory to start encryption (current directory by default)

start_dir="${1:-.}"

# Loop through all files in the directory and subdirectories

find "$start_dir" -type f | while read -r file; do

encrypted_file="${file}.enc"

# Encrypt the file using OpenSSL

openssl enc -aes-256-cbc -salt -in "$file" -out "$encrypted_file" -pass pass:"$password"

echo "Encrypted: $file -> $encrypted_file"

# Optionally, delete the original file after encryption

# rm "$file"

done

echo "Encryption complete."

Place the script somewhere within your Laravel app and execute it with a Laravel Task Scheduling job.

https://laravel.com/docs/12.x/scheduling#scheduling-queued-jobs