Unlocking a Volume locked by bitlocker

Question

Hello there,

my Laptop locked itself with Bitlocker after putting it into rest mode (Windows 10).
Unfortunately, I don't know the Bitlocker key required to decrypt the (main) drive, and hence I cannot access the laptop.

I tried to access the recovery key via troubleshooting and using the command prompt.
I tried the following commands which did not work:

manage-bde -protectors C: -get ( It says that the drive has to be unlocked via the system control)
manage -bde -off C: (It says that the volume is locked)
manage-bde –protectors –disable C: -rebootcount 0 ( It says volume is locked)

Its an Old ThinkpadT420, which does not have a secure boot to be toggled off, at least the option wasn't shown in the BIOS.

Can I somehow access the text-file with the Bitlocker key via the command prompt and the recovery key Id (or otherwise)?
What other options are there to turn off Bitlocker and unlock the volume or drive? (I do not access to Powershell).
Does booting the Laptop via a boot CD help?

Help much appreciated,

Thanks

Answer 1

You need to clean install the device.

Answer 2

Hi,

There is no way to avoid rebuilding the device from scratch if you don’t have the recovery key.

Have you tried recovering the key from a Microsoft account:

https://support.microsoft.com/windows/finding-your-bitlocker-recovery-key-in-windows-6b71ad27-0b89-ea08-f143-056f5ab347d6

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