Mount a BitLocker partition on a Linux system

This post explains how to mount a BitLocker partition on a Linux system. You’ll need the BitLocker recovery key to do so, along with the device file (/dev/sd?) of the BitLocker encrypted partition. The post http://www.ctheroux.com/mount-a-partition-from-a-full-disk-image-file-on-linux/ shows how to create one if the partition is within a full disk image file.

You’ll need to install dislocker on your Linux machine. It’s usually not installed by default. It can be performed by issuing the following command:

sudo apt install dislocker

The following steps will let you open the encrypted partition, assuming that the device file for the BitLocker partition is /dev/loop99.

1. Create an empty directory for the BitLocker partition.
   mkdir /media/blpartition
2. Decrypt the partition. 597960-…-581735 must be replaced by the BitLocker recovery key.
   dislocker /dev/loop99 -p597960-…-581735 -- /media/blpartition
3. Create a mount point for the Windows partition.
   mkdir /media/windowsdata/
4. Mount the unencrypted partition
   mount -o loop /media/blpartition/dislocker-file /media/windowsdata/

Follow these steps to close the BitLocker partition.

1. Unmount the unencrypted partition
   umount /media/windowsdata/
2. Unmount the BitLocker partition
   umount /media/blpartition
3. Release the loop device file if used.
   losetup -d /dev/loop99