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I have dual boot configured on the same disk. There was Windows 10 (encrypted by BitLocker) on the first partition and Debian (bullseye encrypted by LUKS) on the second one. Moreover there was secure boot enabled. It worked over one year without any problem.

Yesterday I have preformed upgrade on Debian to testing realease. After that I'm not able to login to Windows. First of all the Windows was not seen in GRUB. I added GRUB_DISABLE_OS_PROBER=false to GRUB configuration and after that Windows is shown in GRUB window.

However there is a problem that when I choose Windows to boot there appears window with request for providing BitLocker recovery key. Unfortunately I can not find the key. During Debian upgrade there was also GRUB upgrade and I think that this is the root casue of my problem.

I performed GRUB downgrade, I was trying to boot to Windows directly (without GRUB), disable/enable secure boot but not of them help.

My PC: ASUS VivoBook S15 M533IA R7-4700U/16GB/512GB

root@debian:~# lsblk
NAME                MAJ:MIN RM   SIZE RO TYPE  MOUNTPOINTS
nvme0n1             259:0    0 476.9G  0 disk  
├─nvme0n1p1         259:1    0   550M  0 part  /boot/efi
├─nvme0n1p2         259:2    0    16M  0 part  
├─nvme0n1p3         259:3    0 238.7G  0 part  
├─nvme0n1p4         259:4    0   508M  0 part  
├─nvme0n1p5         259:5    0   954M  0 part  /boot
└─nvme0n1p6         259:6    0 236.2G  0 part  
  └─nvme0n1p6_crypt 254:0    0 236.2G  0 crypt 
    ├─vg-root       254:1    0  27.9G  0 lvm   /
    └─vg-user       254:2    0 208.3G  0 lvm   /home

Is there any possibility to login to Windows system without providing this key? Do you think that if I remove boot and debian partitions it might helps?

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
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I choose Windows to boot there appears window with request for providing BitLocker recovery key. Unfortunately I can not find the key.

If you usually log in with a Microsoft Account it will probably be saved in your online account for you.

Is there any possibility to login to Windows system without providing this key?

No. The whole point of a disk encryption system, whether BitLocker, VeraCrypt, LUKS or any other is that you cannot bypass it. If you could it would be worthless. ASUS has a FAQ on this topic, How to fix it shows BitLocker recovery screen after power on but if you are running the Windows side with a local account (no Microsoft account, no Active Directory) then you'll be out of luck.

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  • Unfortunately I don't have Microsoft account. The strange thing for me is the fact that it worked for over than one year without providing recovery key. I wonder if there is a possibility to somehow go back to previous settings and login to Windows.
    – Kamil
    Dec 13, 2022 at 10:57
  • No. You need the BitLocker recovery key
    – roaima
    Dec 13, 2022 at 12:41
  • So, it's clear - I cannot break BitLocker. The question is if I can somehow skip this windows? As far as I understand it appears because there have been performed some changes on boot partition, am I right? Assuming that this is true - I would have to get back to previous configuration. Do you know if it is still possible?
    – Kamil
    Dec 13, 2022 at 13:11
  • No! You need the BitLocker recovery key. Either this or reinstalling Windows is the only solution. Unfortunate but that's how it is. Are you sure you didn't have some sort of network login to the computer? Even if just once at initial setup time
    – roaima
    Dec 13, 2022 at 13:17
  • No, I have never login to Microsoft Account on this PC. Ok, I understand. I asked about it because I had a situation when I changed one parameters in the UEFI (not related with booting) and the window with recovery key appeared. After that I went back to the previous value of this parameter and I was able to login to Windows without providing recovery key. That's why I was hoping that maybe this time I can do the similar thing.
    – Kamil
    Dec 13, 2022 at 13:27

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