andrew54941

Q: Does Keychain Store Decryption Keys?

Hi I have an encrypted external hard drive that I had encrypted with my mac and the key is lost.

If I had never typed the password in before, will the decryption key still be there since I encrypted it with the same mac?

( if that makes sense)

Thank you.

iMac (27-inch, Late 2012), OS X Yosemite (10.10)

Posted on Feb 14, 2015 9:29 AM

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Q: Does Keychain Store Decryption Keys?

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  • by Brett L,Helpful

    Brett L Brett L Feb 16, 2015 6:40 AM in response to andrew54941
    Community Specialists
    Feb 16, 2015 6:40 AM in response to andrew54941

    Howdy Andrew,

     

    If you used Disk Utility to create an encrypted disk image, and you used the default setting for saving the password, then it would have been in your Keychain. See this article for reference -

     

    How to create a password-protected (encrypted) disk image - Apple Support

     

    This article describes how to search for a password that is stored in Keychain Access -

     

    Choosing good passwords in Mac OS X - Apple Support

     

    See the section titled Storing passwords in a Keychain.

     

    Thanks for using Apple Support Communities.

     

    Best,

     

    Brett L 

  • by andrew54941,

    andrew54941 andrew54941 Feb 16, 2015 9:10 AM in response to Brett L
    Level 1 (4 points)
    iCloud
    Feb 16, 2015 9:10 AM in response to Brett L

    Thank you for the response Brett although it did not answer my question.  If I have a previously encrypted hard drive, will it save the password since I have encrypted it before or will it only save it when I enter it after it is encrypted.

    If you ever forget a password that's stored in Keychain, do this:

    1. Open Keychain Access.
    2. From the list, double-click the item whose password you can't remember.
    3. In the resulting window, click the Attributes tab, then select the "Show password" checkbox.

    This is not an option for me as when I double click the key, there is no option that says show password.