The Elusive Facts!!!

How to lock back a bitlocker encrypted drive

Posted by The Modern Buddha , Wednesday, June 8 22:33

How to lock the bitlocker encrypted drive (once after unlocking) without restarting the system :


If you've turned on Bitlocker encryption for a drive and unlocked it and done your work, but you want to re-lock it.perform the following steps to add an entry to the right-click context menu which re-locks the drive.



Step1 : Open Notepad and type manage-bde -lock E: forcedismount where 'E:' is the drive letter of your Bitlocker drive:


Step2 : Save the file as lock.bat in C:\Windows (or C:\Program Files\)


Step3 : Open up Registry Editor by typing regedit in run and navigate to the following Key:
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Drive\shell
Step4 : Create a new key with some name and see that the default value is set to Lock.
Step5 : Now right-click on the key in the left window pane and create a new key called command.


Step6 : Set the value of the Default Entry to c:\windows\lock.bat or whatever locaiton you chose in Step 2.


Step7 : Navigate back to the first key and create a new String Value called AppliesTo. Set the value to E: or whichever drive you have encrypted.Close the registry editor.


Step8 : Now test your new right-click context menu entry.


Note : Works well when administrator account is enabled. If you do not have the administrator account enabled then check out the post on how to enable it or open cmd by choosing to run as administrator and type the name of the batch file in step2 i.e lock and see that the drive is locked.