Does an EFI password block physically changing the hard drive?

[izzy0242mr]

@Weaselboy (since I've seen you post a lot about EFI stuff here), if I have a 2011 MacBook Pro with an EFI password, that doesn't prevent someone who has physical access to the computer (i.e., a thief) from physically taking out the hard drive and replacing it with a different one and booting from that, right? I should know the answer to this question as I've replaced my HD before, but I can't remember if upon first boot I had to enter the firmware password.

Basically, am I correct in that the only benefit of having the firmware password is preventing thieves from booting up from other devices connected to the computer? And it wouldn't prevent them from just swapping my password-protected hard drive with a clean one with OS X installed to resell?

 

[FrancoisC]

The password is not on the HDD, but in the EFI ROM itself. Changing the hdd/ssd will prompt for a password on boot, since it's a different boot device than what the mac expect.

 

[Weaselboy]

@Weaselboy (since I've seen you post a lot about EFI stuff here), if I have a 2011 MacBook Pro with an EFI password, that doesn't prevent someone who has physical access to the computer (i.e., a thief) from physically taking out the hard drive and replacing it with a different one and booting from that, right?

It would prevent that. The EFI password locks the system to the current boot drive.

And it wouldn't prevent them from just swapping my password-protected hard drive with a clean one with OS X installed to resell?

An EFI password would prevent this.

 

[SteveJUAE]

@Weaselboy (since I've seen you post a lot about EFI stuff here), if I have a 2011 MacBook Pro with an EFI password, that doesn't prevent someone who has physical access to the computer (i.e., a thief) from physically taking out the hard drive and replacing it with a different one and booting from that, right? I should know the answer to this question as I've replaced my HD before, but I can't remember if upon first boot I had to enter the firmware password.

Basically, am I correct in that the only benefit of having the firmware password is preventing thieves from booting up from other devices connected to the computer? And it wouldn't prevent them from just swapping my password-protected hard drive with a clean one with OS X installed to resell?

The only secure thing you can do is encrypt your drive as Apple (with original receipts) or for around $70 I understand you can get the firmware unlocked and then swap the drive etc