There are various encryption technologies available, many great ones for free, but it is becoming more common now for laptops to ship with Trusted Platform Module (TPM) chips. These chips help store encryption keys for Microsoft's Bitlocker full-disk encryption technology. Using Bitlocker means that even if a hard disk is physically removed from a computer, the data can never be accessed as the TPM chip on the computer's motherboard isn't able to verify the unlock password.īitlocker is a highly effective technology but like all encryption it needs to be used with care. If you have a TPM chip on your computer's motherboard then the full Bitlocker options are available to you and it is very easy to set up. In the main Bitlocker window you can choose which drives you want to encrypt. The main OS drive will always need to be encrypted so you will need to do this first, you cannot encrypt any secondary drives unless the main drive containing your copy of Windows is encrypted first. Note: Bitlocker can be found in Windows Vista and Windows 7 Enterprise and Ultimate editions
If you use a laptop for work, or it you carry important or sensitive data with you then it should be encrypted. Put simply the repercussions of not using encryption are far too serious to imagine with substantial fines being probably the least significant to a loss of customer and market confidence being the worst. For a small company though the fines for not complying properly with data protection regulations and leaving information "in the open" can shut a company down. For the individual you could find that suddenly everything a criminal needs to steal your identity is in the public domain.
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