Is there any reason why harddrives are not encrypted by default?

[calccrypto]

As the title says: "is there any reason why harddrives are not encrypted by default?" it can be set up during the first run of the computer. so many people lose laptops every day, and some of the data on the harddrives will definitely be personal, so why not hide it if someone can just pull the harddrive out and look through it using another computer? most people wouldnt really notice a file decrypting, since most algorithms are ridiculously fast.

of course there would be the option to decrypt the harddrive (if encrypted hd were default).

 

[pparks1]

Because if you forget the decryption key..you have lost everything.

I keep the important personal stuff in a true crypt container. But nothing else is encrypted.

 

[calccrypto]

thats true, which is why people should learn to memorize passwords better.

any other reason?

 

[Petey7]

A good memory isn't exactly something you can learn...

Another reason off the top my head is choice. I want to be asked before a such a thing was done on my computer.

 

[pparks1]

I wouldn't trust it. Probably would have some emergency backdoor to recover data when the lost password issue arises.

Plus, on a gaming computer, etc....who would want the extra cycles wasted encrypting and decrypting files? I know that I wouldn't.

 

[Jonathan_King]

thats true, which is why people should learn to memorize passwords better.

any other reason?

It would make data recovery much more difficult. Sometimes you could just clone the drive, sector for sector, and hope that the key could still be decrypted, but that would be too risky for the average person.

 

[calccrypto]

i guess... but if harddrives were encrypted back when bill gates said his famous quote, then today, it might not be treated as too risky, right?

also, i was hoping gaming computers wouldnt be involved, since maybe gamers would decrypt their hdd beforehand or something

im not really going anywhere with this. im just curious

 

[GeneO]

Simply because of performance. Encryption is CPU intensive. Every file operation would involve either decrypting or encrypting at the block level.