Robert Bradley - 2024-05-08

I am experiencing a problem using “Secure Desktop” in preferences in Veracrypt 1.26.7 (64 bit) on up to date Windows 11 Pro 23H2 systems that does not occur when using up to date Windows 10 Pro 22H2 systems.
I have the need to use many encrypted containers and encrypted devices simultaneously. Some of the containers are encrypted containers within another encrypted container and some are containers within encrypted devices.

Everything works properly on my Windows 10 machines but not on any of my Windows 11 machines, not even on a brand new laptop. When “Secure Desktop” is disabled, everything works correctly but not when it is enabled. On trying to open the third container the screen goes dark as usual and I am able to enter the password in the input field. However, when pressing enter, the whole screen then goes dark and the computer becomes unusable. My only option then seems to be Ctrl/Alt/Del and to click on sign out of the user.

The problem can easily be reproduced as follows:
(1) Put a tick in “Use secure desktop for password entry” in preferences and click OK.
(2) Open an encrypted container “Aaa-one” with PKCS-5 PRF using BLAKE2s-256 in the C:/User/Me folder of the computer as drive “M:”. The screen goes black (not blue like in Windows 10), enter the password and “M:” comes online.
(3) Open an encrypted container “Aaa-two” with PKCS-5 PRF using BLAKE2s-256 that is a file within the drive “M:\Aaa-one” as drive “W”. The screen goes black, enter the password and “W:” comes online.
(4) Open an encrypted USB flash drive with PKCS-5 PRF using BLAKE2s-256 as drive “S”. The screen goes black, enter the password and click on OK. The password box disappears but you are left with only an all black screen. The only option then is to Ctrl/Alt/Delete and use Task Manager.

While I have found the work-around of disabling “Secure Desktop” in preferences, the problem could do with being corrected in a future release please.