one hour), one can surmise that the drive data is encrypted with a drive-specific key K, which never changes, and that key is stored somewhere on the disk (possibly in some EEPROM) encrypted with a password-derived key.
Since the user password can be changed (page 28) without implying a complete re-encryption of the disk (it would take some non-negligible time, e.g. The screenshot page 26 shows a warning to the effect that WD themselves won't be able to recover the data when a password is lost, so it is probable that: This reinforces the idea that everything occurs on the drive. , we also see that a locked drive can still be used on a machine where the WD software is not installed, provided that you still use the software for a one-time unlock operation (this application is shown by the hard drive to the computer as a virtual CD-ROM emulated by the USB firmware on the drive).
This hints at a security feature done on the drive itself, not in software on the host computer. All we can do is infer.įrom the documentation, we see that the password must be re-entered in a number of conditions (drive unplugged, computer shut down, computer put to sleep.) which boil down to: the drive was not powered at some time. What isn't documented, is not documented.
