Passware Decrypts Microsoft BitLocker To Go Thumb Drives

Passware, Inc., a privately-held corporation with headquarters in Mountain View, CA and a software development and engineering office in Moscow, Russia, announces a new product enhancement to Passware Kit Forensic 10.1 that allows for cracking of BitLocker To Go USB Disks.

Passware’s BitLocker decryption capabilities, first introduced in November 2009, support all types of hard disk images, including raw image files, images created with Guidance EnCase or any other forensic tool.

"This enhanced solution for computer forensics allows the entire memory capture and decryption process to take no more than 40 minutes regardless of the complexity of the password," said Dmitry Sumin, president of Passware, Inc.

With today’s announcement, Passware Kit Forensics 10.1 is capable now of cracking portable USB disks encrypted with BitLocker To Go. This solution includes live target memory acquisition and BitLocker encryption key recovery that allows computer forensics to gain easily full access to the contents of the encrypted USB disk. Passware Kit Forensic now also supports BitLocker To Go images saved as Virtual Hard Disks (VHD) – a format that allows attaching BitLocker hard disks in Windows 7 and Server 2008 without using any third-party disk mounting tools.

Passware demonstrated this new feature at the 2010 International Training Conference by High Technology Crime Investigation Association (HTCIA) in Atlanta, Georgia.

Andy Malone, Microsoft MVP, CEO of Quality Training Ltd and founder of both the Dive Deeper Technology and Cybercrime Security events, gave a live demonstration of Passware’s BitLocker decryption feature at MCT Summit UK, August 26, 2010. As published in the Andy Malone’s MVP Blog, Malone notes: "For a bad guy who thinks that all his dirty secrets are safe. He can just simply encrypt hard disks and thumb drives, right? Wrong!! Passware has managed to include the tools to perform a live memory capture and thus reveal the encryption key stored in RAM. …I can confirm I can crack BitLocker!"

In addition to the support from Malone, Passware collaborated with F-Response, developers of a software product for streamlining live analysis, collection, and authentication, to implement a joint solution for BitLocker decryption.

Pricing and Availability
Passware Kit 10.1 is available  from Passware and a network of resellers in the U.S., Europe, Asia, Australia, China, New Zealand, and South Korea. The manufacturer’s suggested price for Forensic edition is $795 with one year of free updates.