How to Wipe out files from H.D.D permanently

AspDotNetDev

Take out the hard drive, smash it into tiny pieces, then put a new used hard drive in. :rolleyes:

charlieg

aspdotnet is being a bit of a smart-alek, but it raises an interesting point. How do you really know the data is gone? I've worked in classified environments before - when drives go bad, they meet a hydraulic press. Still, I guess my point is - how do you really know?

Charlie Gilley You're going to tell me what I want to know, or I'm going to beat you to death in your own house. "Where liberty dwells, there is my country." B. Franklin, 1783 “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759

Ger Hayden

I took a very big zip file of harmelss stuff, and copied it repeatedly to fill the drive, effectively overwriting any space freed up by the deleted sensitive material. I struggle to see how very much of the former occupant of the bits involved could be determined. Because if so, then our drives would have infinte capacity....

Ger

Albert Holguin

I've used dban myself... works great... it is slow but i guess that's how you know its really writing over every sector in the hdd...

The BigV

Check out IS Protector http://www.isprotector.com. It's free if you delete files or folders or wipe non system disk or empty space. It supports all popular termination algorithms and has many more cool features (file encryption, remote termination, system disk wipe).

cruest

my normal means of disposal is an 8mm rifle round. what remains of the platters gets sucked out the exit hole in a shower of metallized confetti.

Member 4491776

Use DBAN. http://www.dban.org/. The version I use provides DOD level 3 clean. Every bit multiple reset. You will have to re-initialize the drive with OEM software, like seagate disk wizard. http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/support/downloads/discwizard/.

i i i

:laugh:

SOFTDEV Luck in life always exists in the form of an abstract class that cannot be instantiated directly and needs to be inherited by hard work and dedication.

i i i

thanks :)

SOFTDEV Luck in life always exists in the form of an abstract class that cannot be instantiated directly and needs to be inherited by hard work and dedication.

DaveAuld

Ok, I Apologise for being a little harsh. But you have been on the site long enough now to know that a little forward proactive research goes along away, and your experience from responses to some of your previous questions and responses should be telling you this. Be rest assured I have given myself a stern talking to and have written out 100 lines as punishment. :sigh:

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wizardzz

Gary R. Wheeler wrote:

educated opinions of your professional peers?

Umm, this is the lounge you're talking about.

"Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming "Wow! What a Ride!" — Hunter S. Thompson

regalsoft

The owner of my local PC shop told me that he has done some work for law enforcement in the past and that they have ways of retrieving data even after dozens of disk wipes. I have no clue how that could be possible but I trust his cousel very much. I have never found him to be wrong in the past. I think the 8mm round sounds good to me. :-\

SeattleC

The "educated opinion of your professional peers" who you only know because they're on the internet is by definition exactly as valuable as the results of a google search. Deleting one file very thoroughly and securely and also quickly is actually quite tricky. Destroying everything that has been deleted when you have unlimited time is much simpler. Anyone with an ounce of programming smarts could write a tool that opened a file, and appended random data onto the disk until it was full. Delete all the files you don't want (and empty the trashcan), then run this little program, then optionally delete the created file. Anyone without this much programming smarts won't be able to tell an informed opinion from a random one, so they might as well do a google search. Will this simple procedure defeat the CIA? Yeah, actually it might, but they do some freaky things to read disks at the hardware level. If the family photos you are deleting are child porn or jihadist training films, running the program about 10 times with different random seeds is probably good enough.

i i i

Thank.hmmm now you are like the Dave i used to know :thumbsup:

SOFTDEV Luck in life always exists in the form of an abstract class that cannot be instantiated directly and needs to be inherited by hard work and dedication.

pgoodrum

Remove drive from computer and smash with large hammer till theres only tiny bits - that is the 100% sure way!!!!!!!!!!!! :laugh: :laugh: :laugh:

Mark AJA

I have just Googled to find some software to permanently delete files from my hard drive. It pointed me to this page. The answer by Dave has sent me to Google the question again, which sent me back to this page. I think I am now stuck in a loop! Thanks. :mad:

DaveAuld

Caught by a google recursive loop, oh the joys! Right, Here is a white paper that discusses Secure File Deletion. You will also notice at the end of the article a list of tools, some free, some paid. Some others on the thread have also given there preferences. How secure it is, is similiar to how secure a password algo is, i.e. how much time and effort (/cost) is required to recover meaningful data. There are also standards used by the DOD etc which determine minimum strategies required to meet 'security' standards. http://www.sans.org/reading_room/whitepapers/incident/secure-file-deletion-fact-fiction_631[^] Hope this helps in some way to remove your anger :)

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