Krishna wrote:

> Hi,
> My HDD partition is C: and D:. I have my data files in D:\. in order to
> protect my data i had applied encrytion to all the folders and files in this
> drive. recently my C: was formatted and Win XP was reinstalled...my D:\ was
> not formatted...
>
> Now i'm not able to open, view or worse even copy these files in D:\ i tried
> removing the encryption by it displays a error message that "error in
> applying attributes"
>
> Can any one please let me know on how to decrypt the files and folders in
> D:\ please help as i have valuable data in my D:|

You installed a new instance of the operating system. The EFS
certificate was stored encrypted in the registry of the old instance of
the OS but that registry is now gone. The new OS sees encrypted files
but it doesn't have the EFS cert that was used to encrypt them. Unless
you exported the EFS cert to removable media so you can install it under
your new OS instance, you will not get access to those encrypted files.
There is no backdoor to EFS.

If you did periodic backups of your C: drive (which include full
backups), read up on whatever backup program you used to determine how
to restore the old instance of the OS onto your computer so you can boot
into it to export that EFS cert that was recorded under it.

Before using EFS, use the Start -> Help and Support menu to read up on
it.