Windows Device Encryption introduction, and how to reset recovery keys
Windows 11 automatically uploaded your disk encryption recovery key to Microsoft... now what?
Note
This article includes introduction to several concepts in disk encryption. Because the implementations of encryption tends to differ, I will only introduce Windows Device Encryption/BitLocker's implementation, including specific implementation-specific details (e.g. recovery keys are always 48-digits numerical passwords).
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Introduction of Device Encryption
Windows 11 installed on hardwares that satisfy hardware requirements will enable Device Encryption by default. Device Encryption is an implementation of Full Disk Encryption (or just disk encryption), it protects data saved on the computer storage device (documents, photos, videos, program files, etc.) from unauthorized access (by relatives, thieves or police officers).
By default, Device Encryption stores an encrypted form of disk encryption key (Full Volume Encryption Key/FVEK) in the header of volume, and saves the key encrypting FVEK (Volume Master Key/VMK) to the computer's security chip (TPM/Trusted Platform Module), so that the security chip will protect the VMK, and make sure only under certain secured environment will it allow the OS to decrypt disk. This makes sure that only the owner of the computer can access the data on it. But if the device is broken, and you attach the hard disk onto another computer, you won't be able to decrypt it, and all data is lost.
And here comes the “recovery key”.
Recovery Key
To make sure the rightful owner can always access data stored on the computer, Device Encryption additionally stores a password-protected copy of FVEK in the volume header, and provides this password to the user, this password is the so called “recovery key”. As long as you have this password, no matter when or where you can always decrypt the hard drive, even if the hard drive has been separated from the security chip.
Note that, recovery key is just a password, it cannot be used to decrypt the disk itself. When you use recovery key to decrypt the disk, decryption program must first decrypt the password-protected copy of FVEK in volume header, and then use the FVEK to decrypt the data on disk. This will be mentioned later.
How did my recovery key got backed up to Microsoft account???
If during first setup, user registered/logged in to Microsoft account, Windows 11 will backup the recovery key to user's Microsoft account. As long as the user have access to the Internet, they can login to their Microsoft account and retrieve their recovery key, thus decrypting their hard disk.
It's pretty well designed by itself, because compared to the possibilities of Microsoft using users' recovery key for something nefarious, fear of permanently losing data due to upgraded security measure is always more scary to most users.
But also, Microsoft company has always be in good terms with all kinds of governments, thus Microsoft will provide registered recovery keys to government agencies as requested, to assist them in decrypting the drives they want to decrypt. In 2025 Microsoft provides a recovery key to the FBI, to assist them in decryption.
Also, the users were not notified when the recovery key is uploaded to Microsoft account, so users totally have no idea Microsoft can access recovery keys of their devices, until they discover it themselves or being told by the police “we decrypted your device lol”.
Delete the recovery keys backed up to your Microsoft account
If you trust Microsoft for honoring your deletion request, you can delete the recovery keys stored in Microsoft account, so Microsoft cannot provide assistance when the computer got seized by the police.
Note that this operation will delete recovery keys stored in your Microsoft account, you'll never be able to retrieve recovery keys from your Microsoft account ever again.
You can access https://aka.ms/myrecoverykey in your browser, after logging into your Microsoft account, you'll be shown all recovery keys that were backed up to your Microsoft account, including their respective device name, key ID, drive type and upload time.
After you transcribed all the recovery keys you need to save to somewhere safe (notebook in a physical safe, password manager and so on), click the “Delete” link on the right of each entry to delete all recovery keys backed up to Microsoft account.
Regenerate recovery keys uploaded to Microsoft account
If you consider it plausible that Microsoft is secretly keeping a record of every deleted information, you need to regenerate all recovery keys uploaded to Microsoft account. After the old recovery key is removed from volume header, other people will not be able to use your old recovery key to decrypt the FVEK stored in the volume header, thus unable to decrypt the data on disk.
Note that this operation will regenerate all recovery keys on disk, you need to keep a record of newly generated recovery keys yourself.
The following actions require using Windows' command line tools (doesn't matter powershell or traditional cmd).
Open “This Computer” on your desktop and record how many partitions (C: D: etc.) you have.
Use Win+X combination key to open a menu and choose “Windows Terminal (Admin)”, to open Windows Terminal with administrative privilege. You may receive a prompt from “User Account Control”, choose Yes.
Input manage-bde -protectors -get C: and press enter, to query all “key protectors” of partition C: . If there's a “Numerical Password” (i.e. recovery key) entry with “Backup type: Microsoft account backup”, this recovery key is backed up to Microsoft account.
Input manage-bde -protectors -delete C: -type recoverypassword and press enter, to delete the current recovery key.
Input manage-bde -protectors -add C: -recoverypassword and press enter, to generate new recovery key.
manage-bde would output Save this numerical recovery password in a secure location away from your computer, transcribe the 48-digits recovery key underneath somewhere safe (notebook in a physical safe, password manager and so on).
Redo all these commands to every disk partition (some partition was probably not encrypted, though) by replacing C: with other drive letters, and record all newly generated recovery key, and you're done regenerate recovery keys.
Now, whether to delete the old recovery keys backed up to Microsoft account is up to you, because they can't be used to decrypt your data on disk anymore now.