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HP updated BIOS which turned on BitLocker and locked and encrypted my drive. I never set up BitLocker so I don't have the key or a password. It is not saved in my Microsoft account since I never set it up. BestBuy set up my laptop and transferred files from my old computer last November but they don't have the key. They claim the manufacturers are turning it on when they're shipped. HP states they don't have the key. HP has also stated it's a known problem with HP Envy laptops but they don't have a fix or workaround. Microsoft wasn't any help either. They claimed HP should have the code and of course they state they don't. So far the only advice I've gotten is I'll have to reload a fresh Windows 10 and will lose all my data files, which I'm trying to avoid. I've looked in the registry editor and there are things there for BitLocker. I didn't want to make any changes w/o knowing what they might do but on the other hand it's a doorstop now so I'm not sure how I could make it worse. Anyone have any ideas how to get around this?
Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.
This suggestion is only applicable if you actually created a Bitlocker recovery key. Many people did not do this. Hard drives from HP and Dell have Bitlocker activated by default if you choose to use the Microsoft account as the log in instead of creating a local account.
Good day!
When I shut down my HP Envy laptop today, it automatically did a BIOS update. After that, I also encountered the Bitlocker issue. It was asking for recovery keys that I thought I do not have.
I followed the specified instructions. I went to aka.ms/myrecoverykey. After logging in to Microsoft account, there's no Bitlocker recovery keys in there. I've read most of the comments here and I was in the brink of resetting my laptop even if I'd lose my data. Then, I tried to log in again to Microsoft account but this time I used my another email. Fortunately, I have Bitlocker recovery keys in there. There are actually 2 recovery keys but I used the one corresponding to the recovery ID indicated in the instructions. And yay, I was able to log in to my PC again! I was only successful on my third try because I did not enter 0 using F10 key (the instructions are in Japanese).
Suggestion:
Try logging in to your Microsoft account using all the email addresses you are using or you have used. It might turn out that the recovery keys are in one of those addresses.
Thank you for all the help from this discussion! Arigatou gozaimasu! :)
I hope you can fix your PCs too.
If you ever used the locked laptop for your work or school, try the link with your work or school email even you never created a Microsoft account with the email. https://myaccount.microsoft.com/
It worked for my HP. Hope it helps!
Andrea:
I've never seen a solution and Microsoft, Dell or HP don't seem to be too concerned about
providing one. If they were people wouldn't still be experiencing this problem months after
they first learned of the problems. When I called months ago they knew about it but still
nothing has been done.
After I had Windows 10 Home edition reinstalled by BestBuy (where I bought it originally
last Nov.) I noticed BitLocker was on. You can find this by going to Update & Security
and then Device Encryption. I still wondered how this could be since W10 Home isn't
suppose to have BitLocker. If you do an internet search on this it states this isn't included
in W10. You can turn on device encryption which isn't supposedly the same as BitLocker.
Perhaps this is what's actually happening but the system messages stated BitLocker was
turned on and I turned it off. Device encryption isn't quite the same as BitLocker but it
is related to something called Trusted Pladform Module (TPM). This is a hardware
"feature". If you have version 2 you can enable TPM. To read about this go to
https://www.windowscentral.com/how-enable-device-encryption-windows-10-home.
I'm not sure if this was maybe the problem, although when my computer went belly up
I got the BitLocker message. No one at MS could explain how this happened.
The simple fact is this is happening and MS knows about it but as far as I can tell has
done nothing to fix it. You will have to have W10 reinstalled and you will lose your
data so hopefully it was backed up. Not only am I backing up my data in multiple
ways I'm making an image file once a month so I can reinstall my computer to
exactly the way it was at the point of the image. This means operating system,
apps and data, everything.
You might be able to make boot drive from your computer and use it on your sister's
computer to boot it up and hopefully be able to access the drive and have it
reinstall Windows. I kind of doubt it will work if the drive is locked and encrypted.
Hi Robert, i'm so sorry to hear what happened to your HP computer, and it kinda makes me fear for mine as well. Today i tried to see if there was some signs i had bitlocker, even if unable, on my HP computer, and it seems that I don't, but since a of you say you didn't have it in first place, i',m worried.
So i'm replying just to see if you or anyone else has already found an answer for this predicament. I have to point out that i'm no guru, i follow instructions a the time and don't know many things about computers, at least those sort of things.
Today my sister's Dell laptop got blocked as well. It started by not letting her even access windows 10, since it didn't recognized her password, saying it was incorrect, which it wasn't. Then, since she is younger than me, she asked me for help and i tried to start in safe mode to remove any passwords so that she could enter once again tl her user. Imagine my surprise when it asked me for an encrypted recovery key to enter safe mode or anything for that matter.
She never encrypted her drive, she didn't even knew what bitlocker was. She got frustrated since she is home schooling at the meeting due to covid-19, and her classes had already started. I tried many things, accessing the bios (again, following instructions) couldn't do anything so i returned everything to how it was, since i didn't wanted to mess up even more the situation. Tried removing the user password with command prompt but couldn't since it just detects a different drive, due to the one being locked.
I'm thinking brute force perhaps with a program to get encryption keys or a program that helps me at least restart the user password to use the computer.
All this happened right after yesterday, when she went to sleep, the laptop started updating itself, so yeah, this IS A MICROSOFT PROBLEM. And for know the only thing that seems possible is to restore to fabric settings, but that means losing everything, perhaps you have important things in there, so is absolutely stupid this update and you get an encryption thing.
If anyone has now learned something about this that might be helpful, i'll really appreciate it. Thanks!
