what is FireVault?

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what is FireVault?

two days ago i installed yosemite on my mac, i was in a hurry so i didn't read all the "fine print" and now am kind of nervous. When it was installing i said yes to fire vault on, hours later when i came back home i looked for more info about it and to tell you the truth now am more confused, i wanted to turned off but it says that it needs to finish the encryption before turning off. The thing that confused me is all this "keys" that am supposed to have, what keys? where are they? when am i going to get them? am afraid of getting locked out of my own system and lose all my files, whats going to happen to all the files that i back up using time machine before installing Yosemite? would i be able to just plug my external hard drive and back it up as easy as before this encrypting mess i got my self into? I think i just want it to finish ( it says that still has 8 hrs to go ) so i can turn it off and when that happens is it going to be as easy as just turn it off? or is it going to ask me for this famous keys that i don't know where or what are they are to begin with? i just want to go back to the fast and easy way to log in, now it takes forever to get to the login screen, any help would be appreciated, i might have to call apple support to they can walk me to the process of going back to a worry free Mac experience.

MacBook Pro, OS X Yosemite (10.10)

Posted on Oct 26, 2014 1:35 PM

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Answer 1

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FoxFifth

Level 10

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Oct 26, 2014 1:58 PM in response to Musicholic

FileVault encrypts your disk so that no one can access it without the password. There is more information at OS X: About FileVault 2

I have seen other reports of people turning it on during the upgrade to Yosemite who also said that they did not get a recovery key during the process. The link above describes how it should work and why you might eventually need the recovery key. If you decide that you like FileVault you should be able to get the key by turning FileVault off and then later turning it on again.

I have used it for several years and can't notice it is even on. You may find that once it has finished encrypting that it no longer takes any time to get to the login screen.

Following are instructions on how to turn it off after it has completed: OS X Yosemite: Turn off FileVault encryption

MY Mac experience is much more worry free with it on that with it off. If my Mac is ever stolen or lost, no one will have access to my data.

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Answer 2

Nov 2, 2014 1:37 PM in response to Musicholic

I did exact same thing. I used to work for Apple, actually called a senior tech who told me the best thing to do is turn off fire vault (does take a bit, but not as long as the 8 hours it originally took) then turn back on if you want it. You should have been asked either security questions for apple to keep encryption code or have a record/encryption code come up that you can copy and store. If you want it back on go into settings. I had no option after Yosemite install. Reason being if you ever had to partition hard drive you will need that code. He did say that for most consumers you probably don't need it but it does provide additional piece of mind. Also when you back up computer it should give you the option to have your backup encrypted too. I personally will probably not turn fire vault back on because everything you do is then encrypted and can possibly slow computer a bit, (newer machines probably not noticeable.

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