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The Secure Enclave on the T2 chip was used to store secrets that were supposed to stay inaccessible, even to someone with physical access.

If you use a strong password to encrypt your drive you should still be safe, unless Apple did something really stupid. The password is used as a one-way hash to generate the key.

However if you can login with Touch ID and they find a way to use known SE exploits, it's compromised. Your fingerprint isn't a secret that gets hashed – instead it's verified by the SE which also holds the secret key for the drive.




Isn't a password always required to decrypt on a cold boot?


Yes, but that doesn't help you if someone steals your MacBook when it's asleep.


Someone would have to DFU your laptop before hand and jailbreak the chip, since booting into DFU requires shutting the system down.




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