iPhone back up on my MacBook Air will not let me restore on new phone because they say I don't have a password
back up on MacBook Air is locked and I don't have a password for it
MacBook Air, macOS 12.5
Everything that you are telling us indicates that you assigned a password for the backup file of your older phone.
Unfortunately, the file cannot be accessed without using the password that you assigned at the time. There are no workarounds for this.