BitLocker Drive Encryption is a new feature in Windows Vista that provides enhanced data protection for your computer. BitLocker is Microsoft’s response to one of their top customer requests: address the very real threats of data theft or exposure from lost, stolen or inappropriately decommissioned PC hardware and tightly integrate the solution into Windows. Windows Connected recently had an opportunity to ask the Windows Vista Bitlocker team a number of questions.
Q&A with the Windows Vista Bitlocker Team
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Eugenia Loli
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Nice interview and quite informative, also if it deals more with the practical side of BitLocker (how to use it, what if keys are lost, what if a drive has problems etc) rather than the more technical side of the technology itself – which would have personally interesed me more.
Russell Humphries replies anyway are quite intereseting and explicative. Definitely a good read if you want to know what BitLocker is about.
(Yes we know your favourite OS does XYZ since ages
Shame he didn’t comment on this –
UK officials are talking to Microsoft over fears the new version of Windows could make it harder for police to read suspects’ computer files.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4713018.stm
I find it hard to believe the U.S. government would not have similar concerns.
MS’s reply has already been covered on The Register:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/02/17/vista_back_door_panic/
“Windows Vista is engineered to be the most secure version of Windows yet. It is our goal to ensure enterprise users have full control over information on their PCs Microsoft has not and will not put ‘backdoors’ into Windows, its BitLocker feature, or any other Microsoft Products.”
PLan: Shame he didn’t comment on this –
The you want is here by Niels Ferguson one of the bitlocker developers –http://blogs.msdn.com/si_team/archive/2006/03/02/542590.aspx
– quote: “Two weeks ago BBC News published an article speculating about a possible “back door” in BitLocker (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4713018.stm). The suggestion is that we are working with governments to create a back door so that they can always access BitLocker-encrypted data.
Over my dead body.”
Is bitlocker MS’ version of filevault in OS X or is it something more?
i put more trust in safeguard easy from http://utimaco.de/ than in microsofts implementation.
or use http://www.truecrypt.org/
From what I gather, the only thing that they are doing is extending the disk encryption functionality that is already in XP. If you want to prevent data theft or exposure from lost, stolen or inappropriately decommissioned PC hardware and tightly integrate the solution into Windows then it’s already there.
Although they mention in the article that it can be hardware accelerated. Which would be nice, as my company encrypts our drives and it is noticeably slower than an unencrypted drive.
C’mon Microsoft, gimme something impressive! Like a filesystem that doesn’t fragment!
> C’mon Microsoft, gimme something impressive! Like a filesystem that doesn’t fragment!
Only Chuck Norris’ filesystem doesen’t fragment.
All the other ones do. Always.
Only Chuck Norris’ filesystem doesen’t fragment.
Actually, Chuck Norris’s filesystem does fragment, he just roundhouse kicks it back into shape again
End users can’t remember a simple password. How is this going to affect PC Reapir men who have to deal with DRM’d and encrypted Vista machines that probably can’t even be reformatted without phoning Microsoft for permission
>From what I gather, the only thing that they are >doing is extending the disk encryption functionality
>that is already in XP.
I don’t think this is the case as he said this:
“Hi Jon, I too am excited about Bitlocker. Bitlocker and EFS are two different technologies and are not mutually expclusive. Bitlocker is designed to protect your machine from theft so that someon can’t slave the drive and access any data on the drive. EFS is used for file and folder encryption but doesn’t ensure data is encrypted often left unencrypted are Client side cache temp folders, pagefiles, etc/. The advantage of a full volume encryption like Bitlocker is all the drive is protected.”
Oh… protecting our data. You mean, protecting Big Media’s data that they are lending to us with included DRM
Yeah… I’ve moved to linux.
>Oh… protecting our data. You mean, protecting Big
>Media’s data that they are lending to us with
>included DRM
>
>Yeah… I’ve moved to linux.
yeah and thus you are misinformed. This isn’t about that. Nice that you can’t read though.
MP3’s and unDRMed WMA and OGG still play fine on Windows unproducted and still will unprotected WMV and Divx formats.
I don’t care about you moving to Linux, but I do care that you spread FUD around like a disease like most linux advocates do.
I want to ask a question to people serious about linux.
Do all linux people act like jerks or are the nice people just quiet?
I mean I am getting feed up with this crap about linux and I want to know if its some kind of brainwashing or what?
I am not trying to be a troll, but it’s been getting worse lately and it’s starting to get me greatly.
“Do all linux people act like jerks or are the nice people just quiet?”
No and yes. The nice ones are usually busy actually developing or using Linux so they dont have time for Linux vs. Microsoft, KDE vs. GNOME and similar trivial nonsense.
“I mean I am getting feed up with this crap about linux and I want to know if its some kind of brainwashing or what? ”
It’s the natural opposite of the Windows fanboi behaviour and it’s just as annoying and stupid.