New and Enhanced Features in Windows 7
Windows BitLocker Drive Encryption
- Windows 7 has added security for computers that contain highly confidential data. Windows 7
Ultimate and Windows 7 Enterprise Edition include BitLocker Drive Encryption.
- BitLocker Drive Encryption adds the ability to securely encrypt the hard drive's contents at a
hardware level. Without the correct pieces in place to decrypt the hard drive, the hard disk by itself is useless. One of those pieces can be an external smart card or memory key. If the hard disk is stolen or sold with the data
intact, even a skilled professional cannot mine the hard drive and access sensitive data.
- Windows 7 has extended the BitLocker protection to portable flash memory and external hard drives with
a technology called BitLocker To Go. Contents of a portable device can only be encrypted by
versions of Windows 7 that fully support BitLocker but any version of Windows 7 can decrypt
and read contents if the correct authentication is provided.