[tech] Re: [ucc] Mac ?BIOS? password

[James Devenish]

[CC to tech]

On Mon, Mar 04, 2002 at 03:45:08PM +0800, Paul Day wrote:
> Under MacOS9 there was a pre-boot password. From what I understand (never
> touched this feature myself, just going by one of the mac guys here in the
> office), it asks for the password as soon as the machine tries to access
> the HDD.  The only way of getting rid of that password is a format.

If it's the HDD driver password that was provided with laptop installations
of Mac OS for quite a number of years (before Mac OS 9) then the data are not
encrypted and you can theoretically recover the data.

On Mon, Mar 04, 2002 at 03:29:31PM +0800, Peter Wilsmore wrote:
> Ppl,
>   Someone has sent me an email regarding a problem they are having with 
> their G3 Mac Powerbook. On bootup it seems to be asking for a password. 
> Does anyone know of anyway of setting a pre-boot password on a Mac laptop
> and how you would disable it?

If it's a very plain looking with a picture of a lock-strapped laptop
and possibly a "Hint" then it is probably Apple's driver password.
Apple will of course tell you that you can take your computer to
an Apple Authorised Service Provider who *will* be able to bypass
the security (for a fee). Someone on tech might be able to help
out with that. Also, perhaps something like FWB's Hard Disk Toolkit
might be able to install itself over the Apple driver.

On Mon, Mar 04, 2002 at 03:43:21PM +0800, Andrew McColl wrote:
> Depending on what evil software company thought this particular one up you

Hmm.