Windows 7 - Bitlocker - Lock an Unlocked Drive

**tw33k**

How to Lock an Unlocked BitLocker Drive

Currently, if you unlock a drive that has been locked with Bitlocker, you will need to either restart explorer.exe or reboot your PC. Neither of these appeal to me so I found a way of adding "Lock" to the context menu menu which, when clicked, re-locks the drive.

Warning

Involves editing the registry. Proceed with care if new to registry editing and back up your registry before hand

Here's How:

1. Open Notepad and paste this below in it.
NOTE: Replace x: with the drive letter you wish to apply it to.
manage-bde -lock x: -ForceDismount

2. Save the file as lock.bat to your desktop, then move it into your C:\Windows folder.

3. Open regedit and navigate to: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Drive\shell

4. In the left pane of regedit, right click on shell, click on New and Key, type runas, and press enter.
NOTE: This key may already exist with the value of TakeOwnership. If it does, name the new key runas(2) instead.

5. In the right pane of runas or runas(2), double click on (default) to modify, type in Lock and click on OK.

6. In the left pane of regedit, right click on runas or runas(2), click on New and Key, type command and press enter.

7. In the right pane of command, double click on (default) to modify, type in C:\Windows\lock.bat and click on OK.

8. In the right pane of runas or runas(2), click on a empty space and click on New and String Value, type in AppliesTo and press enter.

9. Double click on AppliesTo to modify, type in X: and click on OK.
NOTE: Replace X: with the same drive location as you did in step 1.

10. Close regedit.

Now, when you right click the drive, you'll see "Lock". Clicking this will re-lock your drive.

Micrsoft needs to fix this IMO but this is an excellent work around. Props to "Jonathon" for coming up with the original method.

Related Tutorials

**hackerboyessar** · 12-09-2010

As per your suggestion, I tried to copy the notepad named lock.bat into c:\windows folder but the permission is denied even after logging in as admin.help me..,,

**Brink** · 12-09-2010

Hello Hackerboyessar, and welcome to Seven Forums.

Tutorial updated.

Save the file as lock.bat to your desktop, then move it into your C:\Windows folder.

Hope this helps,
Shawn

**hackerboyessar** · 12-12-2010

sir.,
Thanks for the concern.But even after doing all these things "correctly" as per the given order, I am getting a msg '"Filename,directory name or volume label syntax is incorrect"....what to do?

**Brink** · 12-12-2010

Set known file extensions to be displayed, then double check to make sure that the lock.bat file name is name correctly and not something like lock.bat.txt instead.

Also make sure that the drive letter used in the command is correct for the drive.

**boogieboy** · 03-03-2011

I'm following the same exact steps and i get the same error when i try to lock the drive "Filename,directory name or volume label syntax is incorrect"... i triend on my both PC's...

ItachiSharingan · 08-04-2011

hello

I know I'm new but I need quick help. does this work also on unlocking eksternal drive that has been locked with BitLocker?

I'm trying to unlock it with recovery key but I get error message every time. can somebody help or redirect me to topic that could help? thx

**Brink** · 08-04-2011

Hello Itachi, and welcome to Seven Forums.

What is the error message that you are getting?

Did you click on the I forgot my password link to be able type in the Bitlocker recovery key as shown in it's .txt file?

Bitlocker - Lock an Unlocked Drive-image1.png

Bitlocker - Lock an Unlocked Drive-image2.png

ItachiSharingan · 08-04-2011

ok so this is the message I get ..

"Error recovering disk H: The recovery key you tipped is not correct.Type it again."

note that I already removed my password, started decrypting my external hard drive (took about 24 hours) and then at the end of unlocking, I guess because I wasn't there, I got message there is an error on drive please run disk check and there was some command but I clicked to close and did not wrote it down..

forgot to upload one more pic.. I am typing that number.. still got the same result

It put's dashes automatically..even if I try to put them nothing happens..

sry about that.. yeah I notice that also but he corrected me and send that one part was wrong.. the part where I put 9 instead of 0

I have a question.. this option that tw33k put here is for locking. so if I follow tutorial in my locked drive I should have option Unlock?

**Brink** · 08-04-2011

Be sure that you are typing in the real long number at the very bottom of that .txt file, and not the ID numbers above it. I can't remember if the dashes have to be included or not, so try both ways.

653939-.............

EDIT for your addition:
You have a typo in that last number you typed.

Windows 7 - Bitlocker - Lock an Unlocked Drive

Bitlocker - Lock an Unlocked Drive

Bitlocker - Lock an Unlocked Drive problems?