See Protect your Mac information with encryption. You can also encrypt a disk and protect it with a password without erasing it. With whatever drive you choose, you will want to make sure that every thing you put on the drive is secure. You can encrypt your data without erasing it by turning on FileVault in Privacy & Security settings (see Encrypt Mac data with FileVault).

If the Security Options button is not available, you can’t use Disk Utility to perform a secure erase on the storage device. Secure erase options are available only for some types of storage devices. (Optional) If available, click Security Options, use the slider to choose how many times to write over the erased data, then click OK. To change the password later, select the volume in the sidebar, then choose File > Change Password. In the sidebar, select the storage device you want to encrypt.Ĭlick the Scheme pop-up menu, then choose GUID Partition Map.Ĭlick the Format pop-up menu, then choose an encrypted file system format.Įnter and verify a password, then click Choose. If Disk Utility isn’t open, click the Launchpad icon in the Dock, type Disk Utility in the Search field, then click the Disk Utility icon. In the Disk Utility app on your Mac, choose View > Show All Devices. If the device contains any files you want to save, copy them to another storage device or volume.

How to password protect a thumb drive