recover data from bitlocker encrypted drive without key

If the drive is moved from one device to another, BitLocker immediately picks it up and asks the user for the Recovery Key instead of the regular PIN/password, as an added security measure. Therefore, the Recovery Key will only work on that particular drive with a unique ID. The key is associated with a 32-character alphanumeric identifier, also known as BitLocker ID, which is unique for each drive that is encrypted. It is used to unlock the drive’s content that has been encrypted using BitLocker. The BitLocker Recovery Key is a 48-digit combination of numbers that is generated automatically when BitLocker encryption is configured.

Since it is not every day that users are asked to provide a Recovery Key, it can be very easily misplaced.īefore we begin discussing how you can locate the Recovery Key, let us see what it exactly is.

If such happens, you will be required to provide the associated Recovery Key, without which you will be unable to access the data in that storage drive. Your system may ask for the key if there have been too many wrongful attempts to unlock it, or the hard drive may have moved to another computer. The purpose of the Recovery Key is to ensure that only authorized personnel can unlock the data since only they would know where the Recovery Key is kept. If you have set up BitLocker on your Windows device yourself, then you would know that the setup wizard makes it mandatory to save the Recovery Key in a secure location and it simply would not allow drive encryption without it.

Recover data from bitlocker encrypted drive without key