Windows XP Encryption

[Guest]

Hi. A couple of years ago, I encrypted my "My Documents" folder, at the
request of my company. Shortly afterwards, we switched to a program that
encrypts the entire hard drive, and I forgot that my data files were also
encrypted by Windows.
I got a new computer, made a backup of the entire hard drive on my old
machine, and disposed of my old machine. My new box has a different version
of XP.
1 - Can I use my entire backup from DVD to restore my keys/certs/whatever?
2 - Must I do a complete restore to do this recovery, or can I just restore
parts?
(I do not have a recovery agent, nor did I back up my keys/certs. Please do
not direct me to any of Microsoft's oh-so-helpful sites. They directed me to
this forum.)

 

[John Wunderlich]

Hi. A couple of years ago, I encrypted my "My Documents" folder,
at the request of my company. Shortly afterwards, we switched to
a program that encrypts the entire hard drive, and I forgot that
my data files were also encrypted by Windows.
I got a new computer, made a backup of the entire hard drive on my
old machine, and disposed of my old machine. My new box has a
different version of XP.
1 - Can I use my entire backup from DVD to restore my
keys/certs/whatever? 2 - Must I do a complete restore to do this
recovery, or can I just restore parts?
(I do not have a recovery agent, nor did I back up my keys/certs.
Please do not direct me to any of Microsoft's oh-so-helpful sites.
They directed me to this forum.)

Not promising. Your only chance lies in restoring your system to
exactly the same state as it was when you had access to your files.
Since you have a different computer, it may not be possible to restore
the old system and get it to boot as your motherboard and chipsets have
changed. There's also the possiblilty that part of the encryption to
access your certificates is based on computer hardware. Whenever using
Windows Encrypted File System, it is VITAL to immediately backup your
certificates or it's just a matter of time before you permanently lose
your data.

Good Luck,
John

 

[NoConsequence]

Not promising. Your only chance lies in restoring your system to
exactly the same state as it was when you had access to your files.
Since you have a different computer, it may not be possible to restore
the old system and get it to boot as your motherboard and chipsets have
changed. There's also the possiblilty that part of the encryption to
access your certificates is based on computer hardware. Whenever using
Windows Encrypted File System, it is VITAL to immediately backup your
certificates or it's just a matter of time before you permanently lose
your data.

Good Luck,
John

Besides this, what vital government secrets were you trying to
protect? Honestly, there are so many better ways to keep junior and
the spouse, or your drunk buddies, out of your files. Encryption is a
recipe for disaster in most cases, UNLESS you have some sort of state
secrets on your computer.

 

[Poprivet]

Hi. A couple of years ago, I encrypted my "My Documents" folder, at
the request of my company. Shortly afterwards, we switched to a
program that encrypts the entire hard drive, and I forgot that my
data files were also encrypted by Windows.
I got a new computer, made a backup of the entire hard drive on my old
machine, and disposed of my old machine. My new box has a different
version of XP.
1 - Can I use my entire backup from DVD to restore my
keys/certs/whatever?

Possibly. Try it and see what happens.

2 - Must I do a complete restore to do this

recovery, or can I just restore parts?

Depends. Try it and see.

(I do not have a recovery agent, nor did I back up my keys/certs.
Please do not direct me to any of Microsoft's oh-so-helpful sites.
They directed me to this forum.)

That conflicts with what you said in 1 above, or I misunderstand. If you
don't have the backup, you're 99.9% certain to be sol. The new machine
creates all new and mostly random keys so the chances of getting a match are
dismally tiny to none.

You are almost certainly going to need the services of a professional
company to recover them or, rebuild them, if possible. Or, if it's available
of course, restore them unencrypted from another archive.
The encryption is purposely designed so that moving things to another
machine (or even hard drive) still leaves it impossible to render the files
in any meaningul way. In other words, what you have is by design: So,
theft of the files would still leave the thieves with an impressive problem.

I wish you luck, but I have never seen anyone succeed if they didn't have
their backed up keys. Maybe you can be the first?

Good luck,

Pop`