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BitLocker encrypts your drives so others cannot access them without a password. Two new and exciting features in Windows 7 are BitLocker To Go and BitLocker Biometric. The following is an explanation of both of these features:

BitLocker To Go

BitLocker To Go encrypts the data on your portable media. With an increasing number of key drives at our disposal, loss of sensitive data is becoming more of a threat. In this article you’ll learn how to encrypt your thumb (flash) drive with BitLocker To Go (Alternative: Encrypt your USB Drive’s Data), how to verify that the data is encrypted, and how to remove encryption from your drive.

Encrypting Your Thumb Drive

To encrypt your thumb drive:

1. Plug your thumb drive into a USB port.

2. Click the Start button, type BitLocker, and click on BitLocker Drive Encryption.

3. Next to your thumb drive icon, click Turn on BitLocker.

4. If your thumb drive is compatible, BitLocker will prepare it for encryption.

5. Choose a password and click Continue.

6. Either save your recovery key (used if you forget your password) or print a copy of it.

7. If you save the file, ensure the file is stored somewhere safe.

8. Click Next.

9. Confirm your chosen settings and password and click Start Encrypting. 10. Your drive will now be encrypted.

If you have a large thumb drive, this can take a long time.

Verifying That Your Data is Encrypted

When protecting your data or anything you own, it is important to ensure the protection actually works. I took my thumb drive out of the Windows 7 machine and put it in a Vista machine. You should do the following too, to ensure your data is protected.

Please note: If you check the drive in an older version of Windows, you will need either XP SP3 or Vista SP1 (or above) to read the encrypted drive. Other operating systems will recognize the drive as an unformatted drive.

To verify that your data is protected:

1. Put your thumb drive in another PC and try to open the files. You should see a BitLocker setup file, which shows BitLocker is not installed on the computer you’re testing on. If you have BitLocker installed on the machine, you will be prompted for a password (see the next step.)

2. If you have BitLocker installed on the PC you are testing on, you will be prompted for your password. If it’s not installed, go ahead and install it.

3. Enter your password to get to your data.

Removing BitLocker Encryption

If you would like to decrypt your drive:

1. Plug your thumb drive into a USB port.

2. Click the Start button, type BitLocker, and click on BitLocker Drive Encryption.

3. Next to your thumb drive, click Turn Off BitLocker, and click Decrypt Drive.

4. You should be notified your data is decrypting (this will take some time.)

5. Your drive is no longer encrypted.

Now you are familiar with Windows 7’s built-in feature, BitLocker To Go, which helps you protect your data.

BitLocker Biometric

BitLocker Biometric protects your computer by fingerprint credentials. If you don’t have a fingerprint scanner on your laptop, I am sure, by now, you’ve seen someone with a laptop that has this functionality. BitLocker Biometric provides native support for logon authentication for Windows and also comes with an API software vendors can use to protect access to programs. Expect to see more and more programs using this feature.

BitLocker biometric looks to be an exciting feature that will become more integral to our computing habits in the near future.