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- The average user has no need to use Bitlocker
- The average user should be using a local account instead of a Microsoft Account.
- Using a Microsoft Account causes Bitlocker to auto-enable.
- Loss of access to your Microsoft Account when Bitlocker is enabled can cause loss of all your data.
- Microsoft can and will roundly ignore you if you lose access to your Microsoft Account.
Microsoft has painted users into a very dangerous corner. Security is vitally important, but not when it’s almost maliciously implemented.
Even as a security professional I understand that most people will be ill served by having their computer locked down like Fort Knox. There are ways of ensuring security without having all personal content go permanently poof with the slightest wrong move.
100% agree with the sentiment. Working in IT makes you realize how incapable some people can be with even the simplest computer tasks at times. What would you recommend as an alternative for secure data in the case of the average person? File level encryption instead of disk level? Wondering what would be the best way to go about getting my family to secure their private info.
For safety, backups are much better than encryption.
The only thing encryption does is prevent others from reading your data if the machine gets physically lost or stolen. And ironically, that might prevent a stolen machine from ever making it back into your hands.
For desktops, encryption of a machine that doesn’t have critically private/sensitive content is even dumber. I mean, if you have terabytes of CP or are a terrorist, then sure, lock that down to make the police earn their wages. Or do it even if you don’t, but you just want to give authorities the middle finger.
But not much on the average computer needs encryption so long as you keep good physical and network security. And the problem with that is much of it is behavioural - they will need to learn how to not do dangerous things online and off.
In order to protect data is a good backup system - something that just works, is dummy proof, can be administered remotely, and which can restore content easily and reliably.
On a Mac, nothing beats iCloud. It’s encrypted before it even gets uploaded, and Apple has repeatedly shown it cannot retrieve the content… it needs to be forcibly cracked.
On the PC (both Windows and Linux) I prefer Duplicati backing up to BackBlaze B2.
I absolutely agree with you, disk encryption is mostly against someone physically taking your device. Phones and laptops? Absolutely, yeah. Desktops? I have some faith in my door lock, and if the cops show up, have fun with my steam library. Most of the data that is interesting for law enforcement is on people’s phones nowadays, like regular contacts, media, or message histories. If you encrypt your desktop, sure, by all means do it, but it should be opt-in, not opt-out (or don’t-opt-at-all, microsoft).
Real and fuck Microsoft
I work in IT and understand that the tradeoff for good security is a reduction in convenience. But this really reads like deliberate punishment. I get the same sense on Apple’s platforms. Wanna change your cloud password? Prove you know the unlock code to a device that you no longer own and haven’t had in a year. This is especially awesome when your employer makes you change passcodes on a regular basis and you have no idea what you used back then.
My password manager keeps a history, and it has saved my bacon twice now.
Yeah, they VIP that I was helping when I encountered the above issue was not using a pw manager and the device in question had been replaced (by the org) a bit more than a year ago. We also had an insane pw policy at the time that made users change them every three months, so good luck remembering. So grateful that madness is over.
Cold spare production floor machines. I’m sure there’s a better way, but you build the machine and put it on a shelf maybe 2 years before you need it.
That doesn’t help them recover their cloud account for which they forgot their password. They still need the unlock code of the device that was replaced >1y ago.
Which one are you using?
Onenote
Nice
Ran into this issue literally yesterday. The wife went back to iOS after giving Android a try for four years (I don’t get why, but I try not to judge).
Anyway, she couldn’t remember her Apple ID and had to pull out the phone she hasn’t used in years to recover her account. Thankfully she was smart enough to charge the battery to 50% every few months. Otherwise it would have gone bad and she would have been fucked; literally would have had to pay a tech hundreds to replace a battery for a phone she no longer uses, just to reset a simple password.
I understand and appreciate the need for good security, but this is beyond ridiculous.
…and grounds for committing sudoku. 🤣
Ahh you mentioned the number puzzle sudoku. What you were looking for, was the word for japanese honour suicide: sirtaki.
You mean Sriracha.
No, Sriracha is a spicy sauce made from hot peppers and garlic. You’re thinking of Siddhartha.
No, Siddhartha is a novel by Hermann Hesse about spiritual discovery.
You’re thinking of Sebulba.
No, Sebulba was one of the positive influences Anakin Skywalker had in his early life.
You mean Sequin Pants.
Close but no, Siddhartha is the name of Buddha. You’re thinking of Sepultura.
No, Sepultura is a Brazilian metal band. You’re thinking of Sophocles.
This happened when I booted a friend’s computer from a live USB Mint stick. It took hours to find the correct password for her account and get Windows running again.
A few years ago Microsoft deleted my Linux ext2 directory when I dual booted to Windows and ran Windows Update.
At this point I’m convinced one of Microsoft’s primary business functions is selling malware.
Weaponized security. These fuckers booby-trapped usb boot.
I really don’t miss windows. I’m happy with almost everything else but windows. Fischer price macOS is perfectly acceptable to me at this point.
Fuck Liquid Glass though.
Hm… Eclains why all the Linux install tutorials start with: disable secure boot, disable bit locker,…
This is partly Microsoft’s fault, for sure, but it’s also more of a function of how secureboot works. A Linux system using TPM backed FDE with secureboot enabled would have the same problem going the other way.
Secureboot prevents a lot of ways the TPM could be compromised, so as part of “securely” turning it off, it wipes the keys (otherwise those protections would be pointless, the first thing an attacker would do would be to turn off secureboot).
The main problem is it turning itself on with no input from or feedback to the user, and not giving the user access to the key without using a Microsoft account. I’ve heard of people getting screwed by this because they set up with a local account and thus never got their secureboot key (or did, but it was hidden somewhere and they were never told to save it).
Oh yeah sorry I should have elaborated when I said it’s partly Microsoft’s fault. ATEOTD, this mostly happened because neither of them expected the FDE to be enabled which is on Microsoft for silently enabling it
Literally happened to me two days ago. Everything was fine until i installed gpu drivers and then it said “plz give secure boot password” and i had to abort mid install. Also was infront of a fresh linux recruit.
That secure boot password was probably from akmods preparing its key so that it can sign the kernel module of the driver. This key needs to be loaded into the UEFI to use the driver with secure boot enabled. It shouldn’t affect the bit locker key in theory, but you never know…
No bitlocker on that one but it still complained.
Set bios to disable secure boot (warning check if you have bitlocker active before you do that) and install Linux w/o secure boot.
Otherwise, with secureboot: akmod will generate a new key for you and prepare it to be loaded into you UEFI. That key is password protected, which was the password you were asked for. Depending on your distro it might even get loaded automatically on reboot (just follow the menu and enter the password when asked) or you might need to initiate the load with mokutil and a reboot.
Afterwards, akmods will make sure your graphics driver is signed with the corresponding key that is now known and trusted by the UEFI and you can boot with secure boot enabled while still using self compiled kernel modules.
Problem is that kernel modules are seen as part of the kernel and everything must be signed with a key your UEFI trusts when using secure boot. And initially it’s Microsoft’s key, which you will not have access to when using custom kernels/kernel modules/… so you just create your own.
This is probably my fault, big brother Microsoft saw me replace Win11 last month with Linux and don’t want real OS’s taking up their precious market share.
How can something “enable itself” while requiring a password?
it was already enabled, he just tripped secureboot.
It’s not strictly a password, it’s a recovery key for the encryption. The drive is unlocked automatically at boot by the key residing in the TPM, if the system “hasn’t been compromised”
Bitlocker is enabled by default on new Windows installations, and you can run into this situation by resizing partitions or messing around with your EFI partition. Disabling secure boot without disabling bitlocker first will result in this.
Make sure you have your recovery key, or completely disable bitlocker until you’re done provisioning your system (or uninstall windows altogether)
Someone correct me if I’m wrong, but that greentext doesn’t accurately reflect how BitLocker works (unless there’s some missing context). Assuming you override the boot order using the one-time boot option and live boot that way, rebooting afterwards won’t affect the TPM or BitLocker because nothing has actually changed. If you change the boot order in the BIOS / UEFI settings and move USB boot above the normal boot drive in order to live boot, then the TPM will see a change and BitLocker will lock. But you can just change the boot order back to the way it was and the TPM will be happy again and BitLocker will automatically unlock. Unless you do something really stupid like clearing the TPM altogether.
I guess it’s also possible the person didn’t just live boot and tried to install Zorin while live booted, which would cause issues, but I doubt that’s the case here.
dual boot with windows ? good fucking luck
Switching from windows 7 to Linux really was a good call from me, as in, the timing. I’m glad I have never and will never experience horrors like this
Since about Windows 7 each major windows release has been a bunch of new annoying things you have to learn how to work around, and a couple of fixes for older annoying things that now work better. For example, Windows update on 10 and 11 is actually pretty decent at actually updating everything and finding drivers for fairly common hardware. Windows 11 has some nice window management features built in, etc.
Its easy, just make sure you select the right options during OS setup, hit an unmarked key combination to open a terminal and enter an undocumented command that Microsoft might remove at any moment to bypass certain online/account requirements, uninstall Candy Crush every 6 months or so, enter these registry values to fix the right-click menu, windows search, etc.
Y’know what, thinking about it, its been about 7 years since I last gave Linux a shot on my primary PC, might be about time to try it again…
Zorin is a really nice and easy transition so far. I just started my exodus and have Zorin on a couple laptops and I like it. The phone companion app is nice too.
