Forum Discussion
Deleted Device from Intune - Lost recovery key
Hi everyone,
Apologies if this has been answered before.
Yesterday, I accidentally deleted a laptop from Intune. The result is that it is no longer possible to log into the device, the device record is completely gone from Intune and Entra so I am not even able to find the BitLocker recovery key.
Without the BitLocker key, I can't even do a factory reset.
Is the device toast?
Thank you,
Luuk_P
Only registered devices are automatically deleted from Entra after you delete them from Intune.
If your devices are provisioned via Autopilot, they will not be deleted from Entra after you delete them from Intune as the Entra object is linked to the Autopilot enrollment.
If you have a local administrator, you can try to clean the TPM and install a new OS image on your device.
And for the next time it happens, hope not to, go directly under the
https://account.microsoft.com/devices/recoverykey with the user account for the specific device, you should be able to find the key.
Good luck!
9 Replies
Hi
I ended up in a similar situation recently, and I got around it by following the steps below.
Good luck
1. Start Windows installation via USB;
2. Proceed with the installation until you reach the screen where you will select the disk for installation;
3. On this screen press Shift+F10 to open the Command Prompt;
4. Enter the commands below:
diskpart [Enter]
list disk [Enter]
select disk 0 [Enter](Change the 0 to the number of the disk you want to install Windows)
clean [Enter]
create partition primary [Enter]
exit [Enter]
exit [Enter]
5. Close the command prompt and go back to the installation;
6. Click the update button and the newly created partition will appear, select it and proceed with the installation.Thanks everyone for your input. Lesson learned... It would be nice if Microsoft built in a verification function (e.g. "Are you sure you want to delete this device? Deleting the device will make it inoperable!"
Only registered devices are automatically deleted from Entra after you delete them from Intune.
If your devices are provisioned via Autopilot, they will not be deleted from Entra after you delete them from Intune as the Entra object is linked to the Autopilot enrollment.
If you have a local administrator, you can try to clean the TPM and install a new OS image on your device.
And for the next time it happens, hope not to, go directly under the
https://account.microsoft.com/devices/recoverykey with the user account for the specific device, you should be able to find the key.
Good luck!
You should see it in "Entra." If for some reasons, it is not appearing there, then it is gone for good.
If you delete a device from Intune then it should still be visible in Entra unless you deleted from there as well. You can try opening a case with Microsoft to see if they are able to provide you the recovery key.
Thanks for your response. I did not delete the device from Entra, but it no longer shows there. This has happened to us once before with the exact same result. I wonder if there is a setting somewhere that is causing the device to be deleted in Entra too?
It does depend on how the device was enrolled in Intune. Especially if it was enrolled in Intune outside of AP process.
