Tag Archives: Bitlocker

Security, Windows

Bitlocker: How to require Startup PIN

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A lot of people use Bitlocker for full-disk encryption of their hard drives. For extra security you might want to be prompted for a PIN when you unlock your hard drive, because allowing attackers to boot your system without authentication might open up extra attack vectors. Setting a PIN can be easily accomplised if you know how… 🙂

The below instructions are exact for Windows 10, but they are very similar in Windows 7, too.

Launch the Local Group Policy Editor by typing gpedit.msc into your Windows search, then when it has been found right-click on it and select Run as administrator from the pop-up menu. Then maneuver to the following path in the left “folder” pane:

Local Computer Policy > Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Bitlocker Drive Encryption > Operating System Drives.

This is what it looks like if you did it correctly:

Bitlocker_Group_PolicyThen double-click on the setting Require additional authentication at startup, and you see the following dialog:

Bitlocker_PINNow change option Configure TPM startup PIN to read:

Require startup PIN with TPM

Then reboot. Now you can right-click on your system drive and select Set Bitlocker PIN or Change Bitlocker PIN (I forgot to take a screenshot of this last step, so I’m not 100% how exactly this looked like, but it should be obvious) from the pop-up menu.

You’re done. Wasn’t that easy?

Please leave a message if this was helpful.

Computers, Security, Windows

Attention changing BIOS Settings with Bitlocker

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The Problem

If your laptop has been set up to use Bitlocker, by your company or yourself, you should be very cautious when playing with your BIOS settings.

Bitlocker considers BIOS settings changes a potential security breach, as somebody could e. g. change boot order to boot from an external media to try to fiddle with the boot mechanism set up on your hard drive or SSD. This is why when you change something in the BIOS or just boot from an external drive, such as a thumb stick, Bitlocker will prompt you for your recovery code.

The Solution

To prevent this you just have to disable the so-called “protector” for your boot drive. Only then should you change BIOS settings or boot from a drive other than your normal boot drive.

You do so using the manage-bde tool which is part of Windows:

manage-bde –protectors –disable <Drive>

Don’t forget to re-enable the protector after you’re done:

manage-bde –protectors –enable <Drive>

If this helped, I’d appreciate a comment from you here on my blog.