[AlienRay]

Hello all;

I'm trying to help a friend retrieve photos from a broken BB Bold 9700. The device turns on, but the screen is inoperable. She has a few hundred photos on a Micro SD card she'd like to retrive, but the card is encrypted.

The problem is, she has forgotten her password. I can hook her BB up to my computer without a problem, but she's already used up 7 of her 10 password attempts. I was hoping someone here might be able to advise on the best way to proceed.

My understanding is that, once she gets to 10 failed password attempts, the device will reset, and the Micro SD card will likewise be wiped. I can take the card out before that happens, but my suspicion is that the wiped BB won't be able to read the card anymore.

So does she have any options here? Is there anything that can be done to extend the number of password attempts: either by putting the card in a different device, or trying to open the files on a PC?

My suspicion is she's got three tries left, and after that, the photos are gone for good. If anyone knows different, I'd appreciate any advice you can offer.

Thanks.

[tsac]

You have a problem that can go two ways depending on the options she set. Based on info from RIM, the media card being encrypted will require a password to see any of the files if moved to a new blackberry so you need the password reguardless. If she did not set the option to encrypt then it can be moved. As for the wipe, again depends on the optins set.

do you have a backup? Data might be able to be restored after wiping.

Read here.

KB25484-Expectations when encryption is enabled for a media card in a BlackBerry smartphone 0 1849001131

[aiharkness]

To add to the above, if the encryption setting was configured to use the device key, you are out of luck. You would need the card in the original BlackBerry.

If the setting was configured to use only the device password, you can recover the pictures in another BlackBerry, provided you know the password. The thing to do in this case is put the card in another BlackBerry, set the BlackBerry password to that used on the original BlackBerry, turn off media card encryption, and then move the files one by one using the BlackBerry to another folder. When the files are moved the encryption will be removed.
Posted via BlackBerryForums.com Mobile

[AlienRay]

Thanks for the assistance. I'm going to experiment with your suggestions and see what happens. With any luck, she may even remember her original password.

[Malliard]

I was wondering if someone could help with a similar issue. I had taken photos and videos with what I believe was device key encryption on. I turned the encryption off but still had .rem files. Not knowing what i was doing, I simply copied the files over to my PC using windows explorer and renamed them. Obvioulsy I wasn't able to view them. Researching the issue made me realize that I need to decrypt them first. So I renamed them back and copied them back to the Blackberry. However, know I can view them on the blackberry either and using the BB Desktop manager doesn't help.

At this point, I have a working device, I ahve the desktop manager, and I have the actual files...any idea how I can go about make sure I can view the files and get themlocal to my PC?

Thanks!

-SM