password to unlock your iphone backup file

I use password managers (1Password and LastPass) and this password for iPhone backup was not in either. I'm pretty religious about documenting my passwords so I about flipped my *&^% when my iTunes password didn't work. After reading these posts I tried the password I used to set up my first iTunes account back in 2004. 2004! Fortunately it was the password I used for everything at the time. I've only had this phone for a year and I am 100% certain I have not used a measly 6 number password for anything since 2010.

Thanks! After many dead ends this worked!

andycarmichael, YOU ARE ABSOLUTELY CORRECT. Thank you, you just brought my blood pressure back to planet Earth (the new grey hairs, however, are a permanent relic of this misadventure).

Thanks to your tip, I tried every password I've ever used under the sun - 99% of which have never once been associated with my Apple ID, iTunes, anything Apple - and finally I was able to restore my phone when a password that I use for my electric bill website login and as well as for Skype worked. I have never used this password for anything but those two things, and certainly not anything Apple related - but I have entered it when logging into Skype from my iPhone.

Lawrence Finch, I wish you were right and that Apple didn't have the ability to "listen in". Unfortunately, I think you're dead wrong on this. I'd even bet a lot of money on it; sure, one person may not remember doing something, but count the number of other people on this thread that have had a similar experience and the trend speaks for itself.

Thank you, thank you Andy! Absolutely same experience - finally able to restore using a password from the dim and distant past.

yep! worked for me too! The last password before seting up itunes with new iphone. what a relief to get passed that ever increasing circle of FAILURE! will be great if I lose phone, but to be locked out through no fault of your own, not very nice & very time consuming. No wonder the rest of the family stick with Android!

what you need to do is to put your icloud password without ANY capital letters.

Worked for me

I have an iphone 4... only one word for restoring backup in iphone "HORRIBLE EXPERIENCE"... This file can be unlocked surely by the FIRST PASSWORD u put when creating the appleID... be carefull...

it is actually the password of your Apple ID.

Was going crazy not figuring out what password iCloud/iPhone could be asking for. After reading several of these posts, I started trying all possible passwords I've used. Now, I've only used one password for iCloud, but the password that worked was the windows login for my old, old laptop. I know I would never use Windows login for Apple stuffs. How did iCloud access that password? My best guess is the password was captured when computer went to screensaver. Can't understand why Apple has no remedy either if user can't figure this tricky thing out.

After trying my original itunes pw, my current itunes pw, my phone password and even my wifes original itunes pw the imac pw worked, THANK YOU!

it was my first iphone passcode, the 4 digits passcode

ALL YOU GUYS HAVE TO DO IS ENTER YOUR APPLE ID PASSWORD WITH NO CAPS AT ALL!!!!!!

emilywat90 wrote:

ALL YOU GUYS HAVE TO DO IS ENTER YOUR APPLE ID PASSWORD WITH NO CAPS AT ALL!!!!!!

The password for an encrypted back up is not necessarily the passcode to an Apple ID. I never use my Apple ID password for my encrypted back ups.

Forum tip: typing all in caps is considered shouting and therefore, a bit rude.

Best of luck.

FWIW, my experience this past weekend:

Had backed up my iPhone 5S ahead of going to buy a new 6. Did not check the encrypt box (or so I thought). Came home with the 6 and tried to set it up as a new phone and it asked for the password. Like all of you, I went ballistic at the thought of losing my backup data. Spent an hour stuffing passwords at it, no luck. Called Apple and no luck. Searched Google for 4 hours no luck, other than a link to something called Tenorsoft Backup Unlocker. Now the fun part, its a Windows program and I have gone 100% Mac. So I bought and installed VMWare Fusion, loaded up a Windows image (that's like going back and dating a girl you thought was cute but actually wasn't). Paid $70 for the software, located the backup file and turned it lose using brute force to crack it. It ran for 30 hours straight and was only 25% through and hadn't found anything. So I started going back thinking about old iTunes passwords. Sure enough, I used an older password from last year and it worked. Apparently I had chosen to encrypt a backup at some prior point because obviously iTunes didn't just up and check that box ahead of the trip to the Verizon store. It had to have been checked long prior and I didn't recall.

Now the funny part. In addition to brute force the crack software allows you to build a dictionary of your most common passwords and it tests those to see if some variant might work. I entered the actual password that worked on the backup, and the software said it couldn't find a match. So just beware, you might waste $70 and still not be any better off. I would have bet my life yesterday that this was an iTunes bug. It's not, its us forgetting (as is proven here but those who DID have luck with the software and being able to get their password after seeing the first two letters appear from the brute force.) The same first two letters of the password they used to do the encryption in the first place.

I too am having this issue

It's REALLY DREADFUL

Apple need to sort this out

My iPhone is associated with an Apple ID and that password SHOULD be my password