What is a duress password?

By The StrongRoom team · Published 2026-10-30 · Updated 2026-10-30 · Last verified on iOS 26.x on 2026-10-30

A duress password is a credential you enter under pressure that behaves differently from the real one. In StrongRoom it is a Duress Vault: a Pro feature that opens like any Vault and, when opened, erases every other Vault on the phone, for good and without a message. The free app has one Vault, so it has no Duress Vault.

The idea

If someone forces you to unlock a device, a normal password gives them everything. A duress password gives you a second option. You enter a different credential, and the system does something other than what the person expects. Designs vary, and the differences are important:

• Show a different view. The duress credential opens a harmless set of content and leaves the real data unopened. Nothing is destroyed.
• Erase. The duress credential destroys the real data, then shows something ordinary.
• Raise an alert. Some systems also notify someone. That needs a network, and StrongRoom has none.

In StrongRoom the first is a Decoy Vault and the second is a Duress Vault. They are different features with different risks, and you can use one without the other.

How the Duress Vault works

1. You make a Vault and fill it with ordinary items that look believable.
2. In Settings you choose "Make this the Duress Vault" and confirm the warning.
3. Later, opening that Vault with its own pattern or passphrase destroys the keys of every other Vault on the phone. Without its keys, an encrypted Vault cannot be read, even by us. That is called crypto-erase.
4. Nothing on screen says it happened. The attempt log is cleared too.

A Duress Vault has no special icon and nothing marks it; in every other way it is a normal Vault.

Why it is a Pro feature

A Duress Vault needs a second Vault to erase. The free app has one Vault, with the Empty Vault for a credential that opens nothing, so there is nothing for a Duress Vault to protect or to be. Pro adds more than one Vault and the Duress Vault. Recovery and export are never behind Pro.

The risks, plainly

• There is no undo. There is no cloud copy. The only way back is an Export Package you made earlier and kept elsewhere, plus the Recovery Phrase of that Vault. Make your Export Packages before you rely on a Duress Vault.
• It can go wrong by accident. If you enter the Duress Vault's credential by mistake, or let someone else, the other Vaults are gone. Choose a credential you will not enter by habit, and tell nobody.
• It is not proof. It cannot show that the other Vaults never existed. Someone who has seen the app, or who examines the phone, may suspect.
• Local only. It does not touch originals you kept in Photos, or Export Packages you saved elsewhere.
• The law. In some places, destroying data when asked to unlock a device can itself be an offence. Know the rules where you are. This is not legal advice.
• It does not stop everything. Someone who demands every credential, or who does not accept that there is only one Vault, is not satisfied by it.

Is it for you?

It is a last resort for people who might be forced to unlock a phone and would rather lose their data than hand it over. For most people a long passphrase, short auto-lock and a Decoy Vault are enough, and carry none of the destructive risk. If you do use it, practise the whole routine on throwaway Vaults first, since a Duress Vault set up in a hurry is easy to trip.

Keep reading

• Plausible deniability in apps
• Duress Vault feature page
• Is a Duress Vault legal?
• What is crypto-erase?
• What StrongRoom does not protect against

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