External drive or Portable drive? PCB swap remove encrypt?

I’m not an disk encryption expert but from the Wiki about it

Disk encryption uses disk encryption software or hardware to encrypt every bit of data that goes on a disk or disk volume. It is used to prevent unauthorized access to data storage.

Expressions full disk encryption (FDE) or whole disk encryption signify that everything on disk is encrypted.

So … if you swap the PCB’s over then the encrypted data on the disk still needs the encryption key to unlock the data.

And if it was as simple as swapping PCB’s to access encrypted data then encryption would be pretty pointless if it was that easy … don’t you think ?

1 Like

Thank you for the answer :slight_smile:
I ask it because I wasn’t know that, and I want to make sure that all the data on my second drive is safe while I leave it alone.

From my WD My Passport Ultra (Backup) page:

  1. “You can set an optional password to activate 256-bit hardware encryption and add a extra layer of security for your private files. Because it’s hardware-based encryption”

  2. “When you create a password, the WD Security software saves your password in firmware on the My Passport drive and displays the WD Unlocker utility virtual CD (VCD) as a device in your computer’s file management utility listing”

My title and question (that WD Admin removed) was:
External drive or Portable drive? PCB swap remove encrypt?
I’m hope that WD stop remove my post because I ask this question both in: Portable drives & External drives.
I have 2 units of WD My Passport Ultra (Backup) with the same PCB model.
https://support-en.wd.com/app/products/product-detail/p/1377
I have encrypted both of them with WD software (HARDWARE ENCRYPTION) and they work ok but I have question:
If someone (donate) have the same PCB model from none encrypted drive
and he replace it with my (Patient) PCB encrypted drive,
will it remove the hardware encryption and he get access to my files and data?
or that the encryption is set on the magnetic plate and not on the PCB?