johan201
Level 1 (8 points)
iPhone

Q: How do I delete old iPhone backups and set new password for new backups without knowing the old password?

I dont have access to my Iphone (6S, iOS9.2.1) backup password used in iTunes (12.3.3.17) on my macbook (El Capitan). I do not care about the old backups but I would like to be able to make new backups of my iPhone to the same computer. Weirdly, as it may sound, it seems that you need the old password in order to make new backups with a new password. I have tried to delete all old backups by going to iTunes preferences, devices, and then delete all backups. They seem to be deleted. Also, iTunes says "Your iphone has never been backed up to this computer". The tick-box "Encrypt iphone backup" is ticked. I cannot un-tick it, because when I try to, it asks me for the password which I have forgotten. I can press the button to make a new backup - but then it will be made using a password I do not have access to. I cannot press the button for resetting the password because then I am prompted for the old one. It is of course rather strange that there is a password for the backups when there are no backups left since I have deleted them.

 

How can I delete the old password (and backups) and set a new one for making future backups?

 

The reason why I dont have access to the password is that I reset it some days ago but must have typed it wrongly (unfortunately I must have made the same spelling misstake when verifying the password). This got me to think that I could simply restore my computer using the time machine backup of my computer to a time point before I made this unfortunate change of the iphone backup password. If I knew what file it was stored in, I could just restore that file and not the whole drive. My guess was that it would be in my user's library folder. I figured that one way to test this, would be to log in as another user on my mac, and then open iTunes and plug in the iPhone and see if I had the same problem. It was exactly the same. Despite that the iphone has never been connected to itunes under that user. It asks for the password that I don't have. In my mind, this proves that the password is not stored in the user's folder, right? Is it stored on the phone? In theory, I can accept doing my future backups to a new account on my mac, but it seems that even that wont work! If I connect my iphone to a new mac, would it still ask me for the old backup password? (=is it stored on the phone / iClouds?). Obviously the new mac would not have any backups of my iphone - but neither has my current mac and it still asks me for the password.

 

You might suggest me to hack the password by using some software that seeks through all different combinations. In my case I don't think that is possible though, since the password that I must have mistyped when re-setting it is rather long (more than 14 characters). You might also suggest to delete the iPhone, but I would rather not do that because it took me a long time to set it up and I am afraid to loose things (especially when I cannot make a backup before).

 

Does anyone know of a solution to this, or knows about if there is some file I can restore from my time machine backup of the computer? Or perhaps delete some file on my computer so that it forgets about old backups and old backups' password?

iPhone 6s, iOS 9.2.1

Posted on Mar 24, 2016 1:18 PM

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johan201

Q: How do I delete old iPhone backups and set new password for new backups without knowing the old password?

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  • Helpful answers

  • by javaliga,

    javaliga javaliga Mar 24, 2016 1:58 PM in response to johan201
    Level 4 (3,365 points)
    iCloud
    Mar 24, 2016 1:58 PM in response to johan201

    As this article:

     

    About encrypted backups in iTunes - Apple Support

     

    says:

     

    There is no way to recover your information or turn off Encrypt Backup if you lose or forget the password.

     

    However, you do get an unlimited number of guesses.  Perhaps you had the Caps Lock on?  Or something simple like that - you did it twice in a row.  All I can say is keep trying.

  • by johan201,

    johan201 johan201 Mar 24, 2016 2:44 PM in response to javaliga
    Level 1 (8 points)
    iPhone
    Mar 24, 2016 2:44 PM in response to javaliga

    Hi, thanks for your input!

     

    Please note that I am not trying to recover any encrypted information. I am trying to save a new fresh backup of my iPhone to my computer.

     

    If you claim that this is impossible (without guessing the password), then that implies, as I see it, that the password for the iTunes backups is not stored on the computer where the backup is stored. Because, if it would be stored somewhere on the computer, then I could do a complete erase of my computer and by using time machine setting it back to the state it where in before I did the mistake of changing the password for the iTunes iPhone backup. I guess I have two questions in relation to this 1) would that procedure work?, 2) If yes, then which file / files is it exactly that I need to restore (so that I don't need to do a full restore of the whole computer?)

  • by elcpu,

    elcpu elcpu Mar 24, 2016 2:52 PM in response to johan201
    Level 6 (16,007 points)
    Photos for Mac
    Mar 24, 2016 2:52 PM in response to johan201

    johan201 wrote:

     

    I figured that one way to test this, would be to log in as another user on my mac, and then open iTunes and plug in the iPhone and see if I had the same problem. It was exactly the same. Despite that the iphone has never been connected to itunes under that user. It asks for the password that I don't have. In my mind, this proves that the password is not stored in the user's folder, right? Is it stored on the phone?

     

    One way to prove the above is to try backing up your phone to a different computer, preferably a PC if you have access to one with iTunes 12.3.3 installed. If it still requires the PW then you know the "lock" is in the phone. I suspect that it is. On a PC you can uninstall iTunes and then reinstall it from scratch and not retain the iTunes data file (it gives you that option). So it would make sense for security that the encryption lock would be on the phone, not the PC as it would be deleted with the iTunes uninstall. If so, your only choices are to brute force it as javaliga suggests, not really feasible from what you said, or to erase your device and set up as new, a time consuming process for sure.

     

    Edit: I just read your reply to javaliga (you and I were both typing at the same time). If I had a choice, I would rather restore the phone as new than to restore a Mac from Time Machine. Just my 2 cents...