How to recover an external hard drive encrypted with Bitlocker?

Question

My computer had a conflict with BitLocker due to an upgrade of Norton, which resulted in the computer being locked. I managed to unlock it by restoring the settings to a specific point in time. However, before that, my external Samsung SSD hard drive was locked by BitLocker. Now, every time I connect the external hard drive, it asks me to enter the recovery key, which is very inconvenient. I have also disabled BitLocker on my computer using command prompts. In this situation, how should I recover my external hard drive? Thank you.

***Moved from Windows / Windows 10 / Security and privacy***

Answer 1

Hello Ed Ragan,

thank you for posting on the Microsoft Community Forums.

Here are the steps you can follow to disable BitLocker on your external Samsung SSD and remove the need for the recovery key:

1. Connect your external Samsung SSD to your computer.
2. Open Command Prompt as an Administrator.
3. Run the following command to check BitLocker Status: manage-bde -status

This command will show you the status of BitLocker on all your drives. Identify the drive letter of your external SSD.

4. To disable BitLocker on your external SSD, run the following command: manage-bde -off [DriveLetter]:

Replace [DriveLetter] with the actual drive letter of your external SSD.

5. The decryption process may take some time, depending on the size of your data. You can check the decryption progress by using the following command: manage-bde -status
6. Alternatively, you can disable BitLocker via the Control Panel:
   • Go to Control Panel > System and Security > BitLocker Drive Encryption.
   • Find your external SSD in the list of drives.
   • Click on Turn off BitLocker next to the drive.
   • Follow the prompts to decrypt the drive.

By following these steps, BitLocker will be turned off for your external SSD, and you will no longer be prompted for the recovery key when you connect the drive to your computer.

Hope it helps.

Kind regards,

Lei