Q: Lost Password to iPhone Backup

Hello Lawrence

I swear I never entered the password, I never wanted to protect the backup, it was done automatically by iTunes. Many people reported the same behaviour (not entering a password) and eventually the password used by iTunes was the Windows password. Even though it sounds awkward, iTunes somehow got the Windows password... I wonder what Microsoft and Apple can say about this!

Nevertheless: I'm happy I found the solution to my problem in this thread, and I wanted to contribute in case others face the same problems as I did.

Cheers

it worked for me .

How I fixed it was I had synced up my Ipad and when I went into apps everything loaded up and it said will install, so all I did was press Apply

My wife finally guessed my password. There seems to be no way to recover this password, this is pretty stupid.

@apple, fix it!!

Apple cannot fix your poor choice of password. What did your wife do with it? Change it to something more complex.

Pete

ReeMango wrote:

 

My wife finally guessed my password. There seems to be no way to recover this password, this is pretty stupid.

 

@apple, fix it!!

What does this have to do with the password to restore your encrypted backup, which is the subject of this message thread?

OMG, OMG, OMG.

I have been using a password on my backups, and then I couldn't restore it. I thought nah, would Apple silently change my password to "1234", a password I HAVE NEVER USED IN MY LIFE? Can't be. Couldn't be. Apple is better than that.

Nope. Apple indeed changed my backup password to 1234. Can you believe it? I couldn't it, but the evidence is there.

Apple do not touch your backup password. Only you can do that. What evidence do you have as you say?

Pete

I have 2 IOS devices. I set the backup password the same on both to a long and complicated password. The other day I had cause to restore one of them. I couldn't because it rejected my password. After reading this forum saying I should try 1234 I did, and it works. I checked the password on my other device and it remains the long and complicated one. 1234 is not a password I have ever used.

Thanks for this thread. The breathe deeply, disconnect and re-plug in is the only thing that worked for me (1234, my iPhone screen log in, my Mac password, my iCloud password, the Keychain Access workaround, etc, etc, etc, and all failed—and I did not have or use an encrypted backup).

But...that second time around (after disconnecting and reconnectin) it simply started up and is now formatting a new iPhone 6Plus, happily reloading everything from the backup with no questions asked (and no passwords requested).

At least on this end...breathe deeply, disconnect, reconnect, voila!

Panic floats lightly into the heavens....

Ok, read through this thread. I have tried every password I've ever used to uncheck the "Encrypt iphone backup" box. No luck. On my phone, deleted my outlook profile which I think forced me to encrypt the backup. Deleted my VPN profile on phone as well. Deleted all my current backups from my computer. Turned off Find my Iphone.

Now I need to disable encryption for future backups, make a new backup, then set a new encryption password and write it down. How do I do this??

thanks!

Dear BL8888. sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but you are screwed. Why Apple have decided to screw us and you is not clear from a security viewpoint. Stupidity and or bloody mindedness is my guess. Anyway, your only option is to reformat the phone as a new phone and abandon all your data. If you store some  of your data in iCloud  and look for 3rd party backup and restore utilities, you may to a limited extent reduce your pain.

Nooooo. So let me get this straight-- if I've forgotten the password (though like many people I have no recollection of setting one and have tried every password I've ever used) there is no way to stop encrypting FUTURE backups?

BL8888, I know it's hard to believe, I know it makes no sense, but sadly yes. You can ask Apple Care, or do more research, but that seems to be the consensus. And seemingly Apple thinks this is ok.

Oh, one clarification, there is one way to get around it if you exercise Google, but it involves jail breaking your phone and manually deleting some key store files.