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Unable to remove the "Encrypt Local Backup" setting even though I´ve never done a local iPhone backup to my Mac

Hello,


I´m trying to do a local backup (first time) of my iPhone to my Mac but when I plug it in I can see the "Encrypt Local Backup" setting in Finder is checked.


When I try to unselect this I get asked for a password. If I try to input the password I defined for encrypting backups I always get the following error message in the Mac (after the iPhone requests me for my PIN): "The password you entered to unlock your iPhone backup was incorrect. Please try again."


If I select the "More Info" option in the same dialog box I get with this error message I get sent to the following article: https://support.apple.com/en-gb/HT205220?&cid=acs::fm-itunes_HT205220


I tried resetting my network settings as suggested in the "If you can't remember the password for your encrypted backup" section of the support article, but after my iPhone restarted and I plugged it back in the "Encrypt Local Backup" setting in Finder is still checked.


It seems this Apple Support article is incorrect and there´s no solution for this (besides wiping my iPhone and starting from scratch or backing up to iCloud)?


I´m running iOS 15.2 and trying to backup it up to a MacBook Pro running Monterey (12.1)

iPhone 13, iOS 15

Posted on Jan 3, 2022 12:51 PM

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Posted on Jan 3, 2022 2:41 PM

If you ever backed up any iPhone to that computer with encryption enabled it will “remember” it. Also, if you have a company email account on your computer the administrator can require encrypted backups.


You put a password on your backup, whether you remember doing so or not. That’s the only way encrypted backups get created. Either you checked Encrypt Backup, or, if you have a company email account on your phone, your Exchange administrator required it. But either way you were prompted to enter a password - twice. However, that could have been years ago; you are only prompted the first time you made an encrypted backup, you will never be prompted again until you go to restore a backup.


When you entered the backup password if you have a Mac and have Keychain enabled you were given the option of saving the password in Keychain (this is the default). So check Keychain for it.


If you haven’t erased the phone yet you can create a new backup with a new password—>About encrypted backups on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch - Apple Support


If neither of those work you get unlimited guesses, so try to guess what password you might have entered back when. If you are like most people it will be a password that you reused. And to speed up the process click to change the password and you will be prompted immediately.


Note that if you do NOT encrypt your computer backup then the backup will be incomplete; it will not include health data or passwords. iCloud backups are protected by default because they require your Apple ID and password to access, so this is not an issue for iCloud backups.


Reset All Settings will change all iOS settings to their defaults, including the Home screen layout. It depends on how many you have changed as to how much hassle it will be. And if you have an iCloud backup you can still restore that, or make an iCloud backup to restore.

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8 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Jan 3, 2022 2:41 PM in response to Solar Sail

If you ever backed up any iPhone to that computer with encryption enabled it will “remember” it. Also, if you have a company email account on your computer the administrator can require encrypted backups.


You put a password on your backup, whether you remember doing so or not. That’s the only way encrypted backups get created. Either you checked Encrypt Backup, or, if you have a company email account on your phone, your Exchange administrator required it. But either way you were prompted to enter a password - twice. However, that could have been years ago; you are only prompted the first time you made an encrypted backup, you will never be prompted again until you go to restore a backup.


When you entered the backup password if you have a Mac and have Keychain enabled you were given the option of saving the password in Keychain (this is the default). So check Keychain for it.


If you haven’t erased the phone yet you can create a new backup with a new password—>About encrypted backups on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch - Apple Support


If neither of those work you get unlimited guesses, so try to guess what password you might have entered back when. If you are like most people it will be a password that you reused. And to speed up the process click to change the password and you will be prompted immediately.


Note that if you do NOT encrypt your computer backup then the backup will be incomplete; it will not include health data or passwords. iCloud backups are protected by default because they require your Apple ID and password to access, so this is not an issue for iCloud backups.


Reset All Settings will change all iOS settings to their defaults, including the Home screen layout. It depends on how many you have changed as to how much hassle it will be. And if you have an iCloud backup you can still restore that, or make an iCloud backup to restore.

Jan 3, 2022 6:03 PM in response to Lawrence Finch

Hi Lawrence, yes, I had used encrypted backups before with my previous iPhone X. I deleted these backups when I migrated from it to the iPhone 13. I know the password I used for these backups, as I use 1Password and it´s an automatically generated (strong) password. I tried using this one and it didn´t work.


When I moved to the iPhone 13 I decided to delete the old backups because this time I migrated using the wireless process where you get both devices close to each other and then just go through the migration prompts that come up on the new device. When I tried to backup the new iPhone to my Mac I also generated a new (automated) backup password with 1Password and I tried using it to replace the old password I had been using for the previous (now deleted) backups, using the "Change Password" button but this also didn´t work. In summary, I have both the old and new (strong) backup passwords and none of them are working.


As you say, it seems my Mac does "remember" I had used encrypted backups in the past, but maybe it got mixed up because this time I migrated between iPhones using the wireless process, and then I deleted my old iPhone X backups and tried to make a new local backup with my new (recently migrated) iPhone?


Anyway, I can see two scenarios that might save me the hassle of having to reset all settings and then reconfiguring everything manually again on this iPhone:

  1. Backup my new iPhone to iCloud using the temporary cloud backup service that Apple is providing in iOS 15 for people that want to migrate to new iPhones (I don´t have a paid iCloud account and need more than the 5GB I have available). After I have made one backup to iCloud I could then wipe the settings and try to enter a new password for local encrypted backups. If this works OK, I´m not sure I would be able to restore my iPhone again from the iCloud backup I had previously done.
  2. Migrate my current phone to a different (brand new) iPhone, and then use the new one to try and start doing local backups again. Hopefully this one should ask me for a brand new backup encryption password the first time I try to do this and then everything would be fine.


For now, I don´t have any backups from this iPhone (but I still have copies of the old iPhone X local encrypted backups offline, in the Time Machine backups I´m doing for the Mac).


What do you say? Maybe I´m being too fussy and I should just reset all settings and go through the hassle of reconfiguring everything again on this iPhone? I do have a lot of customization done, and I also use this iPhone in a Corporate environment, so I have to also deal with MDM stuff, etc...

Jan 3, 2022 1:04 PM in response to Lawrence Finch

Hi Lawrence, thank you very much for your prompt answer and clarification!


So, if I "Reset All Settings" it means I will lose all of my device configurations/customization and will have to reconfigure everything from scratch?


What settings will this affect specifically? Will it also affect settings for all installed apps? Is there a way of at least saving some important System Preferences customization (Accessibility settings, etc) or backing up just this information and then restoring it later?

Jan 3, 2022 1:19 PM in response to Solar Sail

This is pretty crazy, because I hadn´t done any backup yet when this happened, and apparently it stores the password in the iPhone and doesn´t let me wipe it even though I´ve done ZERO backups locally.


So, if I now backup my phone to iCloud first, then "Reset All Settings", and plug it into my Mac I suppose the "Encrypt Local Backup" setting in Finder will be unchecked. I could then create a new password for this, but I guess it would be overwritten (in the iPhone) once I try to restore it back from the iCloud backup I did previously?


I´m just trying to see how I could save myself the hassle of having to reconfigure everything back again on the device once I "Reset All Settings" just for the sake of resetting a backup password I´ve never used for any backup... :-P

Jan 3, 2022 6:35 PM in response to Solar Sail

Back up to iCloud for now, you can restore that one later. Then pay the 99 cents a month for more storage and enable automatic nightly backups for the future. There will be a time when you will be grateful to have a less than day old backup.


iCloud+ now has additional features like Private Relay (sort of a super-VPN) and Hide My Email for the same 99 cents.

Jan 6, 2022 7:22 AM in response to Lawrence Finch

Hi Lawrence, it turns out there´s a 3rd solution to solve this. If I use the wireless migration process to transfer the info from my current iPhone to a different (wiped clean) iPhone, I can then set a new local encryption key in Finder for this new phone and I´m then able to use it to start doing local encrypted backups again.

After I did this I just did a full reset to my current phone and then copied everything back again from the new iPhone using the wireless migration process. I could also have copied everything back to my current iPhone using the local backup I had just done, as I tested it and it´s working fine.

In summary, I was able to start doing local encrypted backups again with my current iPhone without having to reset all settings in order to clear the (never used) local backups encryption key, as this would make me go through the hassle of reconfiguring/customizing all settings manually.

Additionally, I´m not sure if this would also have worked if I had used iCloud backups, but I didn´t like the idea of having to wipe my iPhone (without any local data backup) to then try and restore my data from a remote iCloud backup I wasn´t sure would be OK.

Unable to remove the "Encrypt Local Backup" setting even though I´ve never done a local iPhone backup to my Mac

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