If you have a laptop and you have sensitive data then it is important to enable encryption on your computer.
However there are downsides.  If your laptop dies and cannot be repaired, there is no way to get data from the encrypted drive.

Unfortunately we have had some customers that this happened to and they did not know that there was encrypted and there was no way of accessing the data.

You should always have at least two types of backups, but in the case of  encryption, it is even more important to have a good backup.

To determine if your disk encryption is enabled, please follow these steps below.

Windows laptops

Device encryption is available on all editions of Windows 10, but BitLocker encryption is available only on Windows 10 Pro, Enterprise or Education versions. Windows 10 Home does not support BitLocker, but you can still use device encryption as long as your device (laptop) meets the hardware requirements.

Check the version of your Windows operating system

Click on the Start Menu at the bottom left hand corner of the screen:

In the Type here to search box, type “system information” and click on the System Information tab to display the version of Windows used on your device:

Check if your device is encrypted (Windows 10 Home edition)

Click on the Start Menu at the bottom left hand corner of the screen:

Click on the Settings cogwheel icon:

Click on Update & Security:

In the left-hand column Click on Device encryption:

If you see the message Device encryption is on with the option to Turn off, your hard drive IS encrypted:

If the encryption is NOT turned on, click on Turn on to encrypt your device and follow the instructions.

Check if your device is encrypted (Windows 10 Pro/Enterprise/Education editions)

In Windows Explorer in the left hand column, click on This PC and on the right hand side you should see a padlock icon on the drives that are encrypted.

Highlight and right-click on the drive you want to verify the “BitLocker Options”. If you see the message Encryption on, your hard drive IS encrypted:

If your drive does not have the padlock icon, it is NOT encrypted. Right-click on the drive and select Turn on BitLocker and follow the on-screen instructions. 

macOS laptops

FileVault 2 is available on macOS Lion or later.

Check the version of your macOS operating system

Click on the Apple icon on the top left-hand corner of the screen:

Click on About This Mac to display information about the macOS version:

Check if your macOS disk is encrypted

Click on System Preferences and then on the Security and Privacy icon:

If you see the message FileVault is turned on for the disk “Macintosh HD” with the option to Turn off FileVault, this means that your disk IS encrypted:

If you see the message “Filevault is turned off…”, this means that your disk is NOT encrypted. Please click on Turn on FileVault to encrypt your disk and follow the on-screen instructions.