18.9.11.2.7 Ensure 'Choose how BitLocker-protected operating system drives can be recovered: Omit recovery options from the BitLocker setup wizard' is set to 'Enabled: True'

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Information

This policy setting allows you to control how BitLocker-protected operating system drives are recovered in the absence of the required startup key information. This policy setting is applied when you turn on BitLocker.

Select 'Omit recovery options from the BitLocker setup wizard' to prevent users from specifying recovery options when they enable BitLocker on a drive. This means that you will not be able to specify which recovery option to use when you enable BitLocker, instead BitLocker recovery options for the drive are determined by the policy setting.

The recommended state for this setting is: Enabled: True (checked).

Rationale:

Should a user lose their primary means for accessing an encrypted OS volume, or should the system not pass its boot time integrity checks, the system will go into recovery mode. If the recovery key has not been backed up to Active Directory, the user would need to have saved the recovery key to another location such as a USB flash drive, or have printed the recovery password, and now have access to one of those in order to recovery the system. If the user is unable to produce the recovery key, then the user will be denied access to the encrypted volume and subsequently any data that is stored there.

Impact:

The ability to manually select recovery options for the operating drive will not be presented to the user in the BitLocker setup wizard.

Solution

To establish the recommended configuration via GP, set the following UI path to Enabled: True (checked):

Computer Configuration\Policies\Administrative Templates\Windows Components\BitLocker Drive Encryption\Operating System Drives\Choose how BitLocker-protected operating system drives can be recovered: Omit recovery options from the BitLocker setup wizard

Note: This Group Policy path may not exist by default. It is provided by the Group Policy template VolumeEncryption.admx/adml that is included with the Microsoft Windows 7 & Server 2008 R2 Administrative Templates (or newer).

Default Value:

Recovery options for the operating system drive are selectable by the user in the BitLocker setup wizard.

See Also

https://workbench.cisecurity.org/files/4063