Re: Recovery of Encrypted files. help!

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koby wrote:

Thanks !!

Since I backed up my entire harddisk I presume that also the personal encryption certificate (with its associated private key) and the recovery agent certificate were backed up. Where can I find them?

If I would restore the the hardisk using MS backup/restore tool will it work?


I'm not sure about this. The only way possible is if the backup you made was done using the ASR wizard which saves the system state and everything on the C: drive. However to restore using ASR, one boots with the Windows CD, then at one point chooses the ASR option. It then installs a fresh copy of XP, then restores the data from the ASR backup. If the ASR restore does not overwrite the newly created SID with the old one, then you're out of luck. I have never tried this but it might work to allow access to the encrypted files. The bottom line is XP's EFS is data loss waiting to happen.

Best practices for the Encrypting File System
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=223316

How to back up the recovery agent Encrypting File System (EFS) private key in Windows Server 2003, in Windows 2000, and in Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=241201

How to add an EFS recovery agent in Windows XP Professional
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=887414

--
Rock
MS MVP  Windows - Shell/User

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