A few weeks ago, Microsoft confirmed an odd bug in the latest Windows 10 and 11 Patch Tuesday updates. According to the company's findings and user reports, applying the July 2024 Patch Tuesday updates caused some systems to boot into BitLocker Recovery on systems with Device Encryption. Now, with the August 2024 Patch Tuesday updates out, the bug is finally resolved.
Microsoft has updated the official Windows Health Dashboard website to clarify that affected customers can fix the problem by installing the latest update. Those include KB5041585 for Windows 11 and KB5041580 for Windows 10. If you are not there yet and you have a computer that asks you to enter your BitLocker recovery key, just do what it wants—Microsoft says entering your recovery key is enough to get to the desktop without any extra issues:
This issue was resolved by Windows updates released August 13, 2024, and later. We recommend you install the latest update for your device as it contains important improvements and issue resolutions, including this one.
If you install an update released August 13, 2024 (KB5041585) or later, you do not need to use a workaround for this issue. If you are using an update released before Agusut 13, 2024, and have this issue, your device should proceed to start up normally from the BitLocker recovery screen once the recovery key has been entered. You can retrieve the recovery key by logging into the BitLocker recovery screen portal with your Microsoft account.
Microsoft recently posted some new guides about retrieving BitLocker keys, so check them out here if you do not know where to look for your encryption keys.
The problem with Windows PCs booting into BitLocker recovery affected client Windows versions from Windows 10 Enterprise 2015 LTSB all the way up to the latest Windows 11 releases. Server editions were also hit, from Windows Server 2008 to Windows Server 2022.
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