Apple's hard drive encryption protects your data from thieves and hackers. But It can keep you out, too, if you don't safely store the recovery key.

The FileVault security system, introduced many years ago to macOS, prevents someone from starting up or restarting your computer and gaining access to its startup volume, which is encrypted.

In his review of macOS 26 Tahoe at Ars Technica, Andrew Cunningham writes: One other tweak to the install process is the default behavior for Apple’s FileVault disk encryption. If you sign in to an ...