Enlight me please: Hardware based Encryption

RazeG3SG1 · October 10, 2014

I began to see these terms being used and found on SSDs, just how do they work? Like on Logan's video about OCZ's Vector 150 which he said that it has a 256 bit hardware based encryption which is good.

I also (as an apprentice repairmen) heard from some veteran data recovery technicians that some SSDs will encrypt its data, locking it up upon death or at a certain condition which had happened to me once, and he claimed that it is due to these hardware based encryption thing going on.

A 840 Pro of mine was encrypted with a password for no reason and a password has not been set on it at all due to us running WindowsPE for repairs. The same thing had happened to another technician whose Vector just died on him by encrypting the "Rescue" drive.

hammerslap1 · October 10, 2014

I believe what these folks are talking about would be something tike TPM or trusted platform module. what it does it keeps info in the drive encrypted and causes it to be only readable in the machine it is in. so if someone swipes your drive and puts it into another machine it wont work. i believe this gets set up through the bios and you can save the key to a thumb drive for occasions where you may need to move the drive to another machine.