Locked notes disappeared after upgrade to Monterey

My 'locked' notes in the Notes app disappeared after I upgraded to Monterey. They are not on my machine nor are they on iCloud.com or any of my other devices. They were not deleted and there is no "recently deleted" folder, locally or on iCloud.com.


If I try to restore the Notes database by using a Time Machine backup of ~/Library/Group Containers/group.com.apple.notes from the day after the upgrade, the locked notes are there! Unfortunately, the Notes app crashes as soon as I try to open the note in question and all the notes are gone once it restarts. If I restore the database from today, Notes works fine but the locked notes are gone again. If I restore from before the upgrade, Notes doesn't crash but it doesn't have any notes either. (I'm doing all this with my machine disconnected from the internet so I don't scramble my notes on iCloud.)


This exercise tells me that my notes are still there, but how to get to them? Even if I manage to find them in the SQL databases Notes uses to store the notes, they'd presumably be encrypted since they're locked. I need a way to both read the notes and unlock them. I have the password, so that's not a problem—I just need Notes to not crash long enough for me to enter it.


Any advice? Thanks in advance!

Mac Pro

Posted on Jan 12, 2022 12:04 PM

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Jan 13, 2022 12:00 PM in response to christopher.l.p.wolfe

Hello christopher.l.p.wolfe,



Thanks for that info and for choosing the Apple Support Communities. If we understand correctly, you are having an issue with password locked Notes not appearing after updating your Mac. First, try running First Aid on your hard drive with the built in Disk Utility tool, as this can correct simple issues like you're experiencing.



How to repair a Mac disk with Disk Utility



Next, use safe mode to start up your Mac as it does the following things:



  • Verifies your startup disk and attempts to repair directory issues, if needed
  • Loads only required kernel extensions
  • Prevents Startup Items and Login Items from opening automatically
  • Disables user-installed fonts
  • Deletes font caches, kernel cache, and other system cache files



Log in to your user account and test the issue while in safe mode and then restart normally and test the issue again.



How to use safe mode on your Mac

Graphics performance limited in macOS Recovery, safe mode, or Guest User mode



Cheers!

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Locked notes disappeared after upgrade to Monterey

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