How to Encrypt a Flash Drive in Windows 10? A Guide Is Here!

A USB flash drive is a handy little storage device. With it, you can easily transfer data from a computer to another computer. It is small and light, making it easy to carry. However, these attributes also make it easy to lose or steal. If you have saved some sensitive data on the flash drive, this is a frustrating thing.

If you want to save some important data to your USB drive, you can consider encrypting it to protect your data from being theft by a stranger. Without a secure password, it is not allowed to read or access the drive.

In the following part, let’s see how to encrypt a USB drive.

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How to Encrypt a Flash Drive in Windows 10

The ways of USB encryption contain two types: software encryption and hardware encryption.

Software encryption uses software tools like BitLocker to encrypt your data. It typically relies on a password. This way doesn’t require any additional hardware.

Hardware encryption uses the hardware to assist software or sometimes replace software to encrypt data. It relies on a special key (randomly generated by the encryption processor) to encrypt and decrypt data. It is more secure than software encryption.

Now, let’s see how to perform the USB flash drive encryption.

How to Encrypt a Flash Drive Windows 10 with BitLocker

In Windows 10, there is a built-in encryption software called BitLocker. With it, you can easily encrypt your flash drive. This type is software encryption.

Follow these steps below:

Step 1: Connect your flash drive to your computer.

Step 2: Go to File Explorer to find the drive and right-click it to choose Turn on BitLocker.

Step 3: Choose how you want to unlock this drive. Here, we choose the first one: Use a password to unlock the drive. Then, enter your password two times. The password should contain uppercase and lowercase letters, numbers, spaces, and symbols.

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Step 4: Windows will ask you to choose a way to back up your recovery key to avoid forgetting it, for example, save to your Microsoft account, save to a file or print the key.

Step 5: In the following interface, read carefully and choose how much of your drive to encrypt based on your situation.

Step 5: Choose an encryption mode for your USB flash drive. Here, Compatible mode is suitable.

Step 6: Click Start encrypting and the drive is encrypted.

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Hardware Encrypted USB Flash Drive

If you haven’t a flash drive, you had better buy a hardware encrypted drive and never buy a software encrypted USB drive. This is because it may use some proprietary encryption algorithm that is created by the company and hackers may easily crack it.

Hardware encrypted drive is more secure and can be protected against tampering. So, purchase one.

Bottom Line

How to encrypt a flash drive? After reading this post, you know software and hardware encryption, as well as how to let them become realized. Just choose one and do it based on your needs.