Discussion on:

Use cipher.exe for command line encryption

Thank you so much for your outstanding presentation on encryption. I am passionate about algorithms (started when I read about the Enigma coder used in WWII. Beside the companies which devote their lives, income, and careers to Security Certificates, digital ID's, BLAH BLAH, You are the first one I have encountered who seems to recognize the essential, yet extremely fun, approiach to mnaking your computer data inaccessable or unrecognizable. I am so grateful that someone, YOU, has a passion for what I (humbly) think is blissfully ignored, but absolutely essential, and for regular users of computers, I have no doubt it will be among the most import logon, logoff, open/close files issue since we gave up floppies and store data in new ways! it will surpass the idea of locking your door at night - very few people forget to lock their doors - I only know one other who encrypts. At the risk of sounding dramatic -- you deserve a standing applause from me - a kindred spirit of encryption. (Ha ha)OUTSTANDING. Well able was I ere I was elba, and, Lager Sir, is regal.Have an outstanding day. Sincerely, James Dobbin

It was an excellent article and I learned a lot about DECIPHER.EXE, but the reason I researched the issue was because I encrypted some folders in Windows a couple of years back and the windows password was lost.
I have tried to override the encryption and decrypt the folders with DECIPHER.EXE but no matter which way I try I still get the same result: 0 folder in X directories were decrypted.
What am I doing wrong?
I have Windows XP Professional
Your help will be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Mario Lopez

Hello,

I have a 32bits windows xp. About a lot of time back i had encrypted certain files/folders by simply right clicking on the folder. "Encrypt contents to secure data". The user which was used to encyrpt the files is no more present on my system. I want to decrypt all these files.

I have read your entire article in detail, and after trying all possible things have been unable to decrypt these files.

Let me give idea of what i have tried uptil now
1. cipher /c xyz.doc
Listing D:\data\xyz.doc
New files added to this directory will not be encrypted.

E xyz.doc
Compatibility Level:
Windows XP/Server 2003

Users who can decrypt:
User1(User1@MyPC)
Certificate thumbprint: 12C5 3D59 C4B9 737E .........

No recovery certificate found.

Key information cannot be retrieved.

The specified file could not be decrypted.


2. cipher /d /a xyz.doc

xyz.doc [ERR]
xyz.doc: Access is denied
0 files(s) [or directorie(s)] within a directorie(s) were decrypted.


3. cipher /u
It gives an error for each and every encrypted file on my system in the format

D:\Data\xyz.doc: The specified file could not be decrypted.


4. cipher /adduser /certfile:xyz.doc /user:user2

Access is denied.