Everybody with a computer knows the importance of making and keeping backups of important data, right? Well if not, it might be understandable taking the risk given the reliability of modern computers and the availability of ‘cloud’ storage on the internet where many of your photos and documents are automatically stored remotely, if things have been set up in such a way.
However, there is always the possibility of something failing and causing major inconvenience, if not losing critical data, and I’ve been prompted to write this piece by the experience of two people I know who lost the contents of their hard drives due to a mess-up caused by a combination of Windows upgrades and Dell computer ‘BIOS’. This is not to say that other makes of computer could not equally be affected by this problem. It happened because Windows switched on something called ‘Bitlocker’ which encrypts your hard drive behind the scenes. This makes everything completely inaccessible unless you have the key – under normal circumstances this is held in the computer and is dealt with by the system transparently. But if an upgrade goes wrong and there is some kind of mix-up between Windows and the computer manufacturer this key can get lost and then you need to manually enter it when the computer starts up. Windows is supposed to store the key in your Microsoft account so that you can get it when necessary – but some people don’t even know they have such an account or even if they do, they’ve long since forgotten the password. The account is typically created when you first set up a computer bought in the last 5 years or so.
For both the people mentioned above there was no key found in any of the Microsoft accounts tried and the only thing for it was to reformat the hard drive and reinstall a new copy of Windows and all the old files were lost.
The last thing I want to do is cause a worry, but I do advise reviewing your backups, the state of your computer and knowing where any important files are kept. Also make sure your passwords are known – and not just rely on automatic sign-ins. Contact the Digital Life for advice and assistance.