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We Are All Bouncers Now
This week on Battle Born Tech we welcome Stevan, Pat, and Craig.
Bitlocker refuses to approve Stevan’s computer setup and needs do some careful editing of the Boot Configuration Data or reset windows. Just a reinstall would likely keep the same partition problems that is blocking turning ON bitlocker. The storage drive needs to be completely cleared of information so the correct drive configuration can be set. Caution! All programs are data are erased along with the non-Bitlocker friendly drive configuration settings.
Pat seeks a photo slide show that is quick to set up because it is due tomorrow and the photos are not yet taken. Update: File Explorer DOES loop the photos! (It is one of the settings.) There are TWO slide shows built into windows one in Explorer and another in the Photos app. But our solution is simple and will turn back on even after a curious browser borrows it to surf the web.
Criag has a scammer looking for the church email list for going phishing among church members. An office staff members is our bouncer of the week.
There are different ways to count patches but in September that nearly a thousand in one day, and more than eleven hundred across the month.
We are often in the studio Saturdays 9 am to 11 am and Sundays 7 pm to 9 pm Pacific. Have your smart phone or speaker remind you to call! Call direct to studio then or anytime at 775-241-3571 and set up a time to battle your tech!
“It’s not a zero day…it’s a zero minute”
“Congrats on a very complete error statement”
“BitLocker is the bouncer that checks. Let me see your ID.”
“I’m still back in MS-DOS.”
“We call it nuking from orbit.”
“I talked to a few tech guys who have never heard of this before, so I figured I would ask you.”
“Before you change anything, you always back up.”
“You did a good job calling us up, so we can tell you what not to do.”
“Usually we get people calling at the other end of BitLocker. They can’t get it off their computer, rather than trying to put it on.”
“It’s nothing you did. It’s not a virus. It’s not malware. The fix-it programs aren’t going to work.”
“Are you using a Windows machine? I should have guessed. When you say frustrated, I usually go right to Windows.”
“I’m telling you some ways you’re not going to want, but you’re going to want the last one.”
“Even if somebody bumps it or jostles it, in a minute it’ll pick up and start going.”
AI assisted to make us sound more human.
Battle Born Tech,
where the Wi-Fi is strong,
the fonts are good-looking, and the passwords are above average.
BATTLE PLANS
from Claude.ai
Shift + Restart
Hold Shift while clicking Restart to drop into the Windows recovery menu, where Troubleshoot leads to the options for resetting or reinstalling Windows, including pulling a fresh copy down from Microsoft rather than using the vendor’s factory image.
Phishing
Someone tries to lure you with something. Usually trying to get your to call a scammer or click a link. Spelled with “ph” by convention.
Spearphising
The same thing aimed at you specifically, using real details about your job, your colleagues, and your organization. Craig’s call is a textbook example. The attacker read the staff page first.
Patch Tuesday
Microsoft ships its security fixes on the second Tuesday of every month, all at once. September 8, 2026 was the largest one Microsoft has ever shipped. See the fact-check note below on the number quoted in the opener.
Zero Day
A flaw that attackers are already using before the maker has a fix, so defenders have had zero days to prepare. Joe’s “zero minute” is a joke, not a term, but it lands: the gap between a flaw becoming public and being attacked keeps shrinking.
BitLocker
Windows’ built-in whole-drive encryption. Scrambles everything on the disk so a stolen laptop is a brick instead of a filing cabinet. Available on Windows 11 Home as well as Pro, as Christy noted. Pro just gives you a nicer control panel for it.
XTS-AES and AES-CBC
Two ways of arranging the same encryption math. Both use AES, the standard cipher. They differ in how each chunk of the disk gets scrambled relative to its neighbors. XTS-AES has been BitLocker’s default since Windows 10 version 1511 and is the better choice; AES-CBC is the older method, kept around for compatibility.
Elephant diffuser
A real thing, and the joke in the opener. When BitLocker launched in Windows Vista, Microsoft bolted an extra scrambling step onto AES-CBC and named it the Elephant diffuser. Its job was to make tampering with an encrypted disk produce garbage rather than something usefully altered. Microsoft removed the option in Windows 8, citing performance and the fact that it was not FIPS compliant, which locked out government and some corporate buyers. So “the elephant diffuser in the room” is a pun on the elephant in the room, and the elephant really did leave the room.
BCD / BCDedit
BCD stands for Boot Configuration Data. It is the short list of instructions that tells the machine where to find Windows and how to start it. bcdedit is the command-line tool that edits that list. The “locate” explanation is the plain-words version: the factory can tell the boot list “go find Windows wherever it is,” which Windows happily accepts and BitLocker refuses.
Nuking from orbit
Wiping a drive completely and starting over from scratch. From Aliens (1986), where it is the only way to be sure. Not a recommendation of first resort.
Chain of Thought
A real term in AI. It means having the model show its reasoning step by step instead of jumping to an answer, which makes it easier to catch where it went wrong.
We are often in the studio Saturdays 9 am to 11 am and Sundays 7 pm to 9 pm Pacific. Have your smart phone or speaker remind you to call! Call direct to studio then or anytime at 775-241-3571 and set up a time to battle your tech!
Tuesdays 8 PM Pacific 95.1 FM Carson City, Nevada
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Battle Born Tech is a
Registered Service Mark of Christy Ramsey
775-241-3571 or [email protected]