In a storage apparatus, a recording medium has a first recording region and a second recording region. A command executor sets a first and second password in the first and second recording region respectively for performing access control so as to restrict unauthorized access to the recording medium by a third party. An access controller performs the access control on the basis of the first password and the second password. When initializing the recording medium, only the first recording region can be initialized. It is possible to effectively perform the access control on the recording medium all the time by an authorized user and to maintain the security.