If you use encryption to protect the data on your SSD running Windows 10, then you’ll want to know about a change Microsoft has recently implemented in the preview version of the OS, switching its BitLocker tool to default to software encryption rather than hardware, after major security issues were discovered with the latter last year.
Let’s briefly rewind to June of last year, then, when vulnerabilities were discovered when it came to the hardware encryption of self-encrypting SSDs. It emerged that this encryption could be bypassed relatively easily by re-flashing the firmware of the drive (note that the problem only affects solid-state drives, not traditional hard disks).
And BitLocker used hardware encryption rather than software by default, because it’s a faster method that consumes less system resources.
Last summer, Microsoft suggested that users switch to software encryption because of the aforementioned potential exploit that could be leveraged against hardware encryption.