properly wiping data from a hard drive
Discussion
i have a laptop which is a couple of yrs old and powered by steam.
A while ago i deleted some great pics of my car, believing i had them backed up - which is not the case
about 6 months later, the laptop got a virus and i reinstalled the OS and it all seems cool now, but judging by what the above posts say, is there any way of retrieving my M3 pictures out of the machine ?
A while ago i deleted some great pics of my car, believing i had them backed up - which is not the case
about 6 months later, the laptop got a virus and i reinstalled the OS and it all seems cool now, but judging by what the above posts say, is there any way of retrieving my M3 pictures out of the machine ?
First up ask the charity if they want an OS installed, some do, some don't. Depends on how they interpret the MS OEM license.
If they don't, just format the disk a couple of times (use the Windows install CD).
If they do, just format the disk and install Windows again.
Getting data off a drive is virtually always 'possible' but the costs associated with doing so rise quite dramatically quite quickly. Two formats and a reinstall should be enough. The only sure fire way to stop anyone getting the data off it is a blast furnace and sea burial for the resultant slag.
If they don't, just format the disk a couple of times (use the Windows install CD).
If they do, just format the disk and install Windows again.
Getting data off a drive is virtually always 'possible' but the costs associated with doing so rise quite dramatically quite quickly. Two formats and a reinstall should be enough. The only sure fire way to stop anyone getting the data off it is a blast furnace and sea burial for the resultant slag.
Download PGP Desktop and use the PGP Shred tool to delete the files, then run the PGP Free Space wipe to securely erase the free space as well, this overwrites old stuff that bas been deleted.
How secure it needs to be depends on free time, the free space wipe takes about 2 hours for 1 pass on my PC with 200GB free space.
The program says 3 passes is needed for secure home, upto 23 passes for military standard.
This takes a while, but it removes data to the point where it will be unbelievably difficult to recover anything! The encryption is also very good!
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Stuart
How secure it needs to be depends on free time, the free space wipe takes about 2 hours for 1 pass on my PC with 200GB free space.
The program says 3 passes is needed for secure home, upto 23 passes for military standard.
This takes a while, but it removes data to the point where it will be unbelievably difficult to recover anything! The encryption is also very good!
-
Stuart
sstein said:
Download PGP Desktop and use the PGP Shred tool to delete the files, then run the PGP Free Space wipe to securely erase the free space as well, this overwrites old stuff that bas been deleted.
How secure it needs to be depends on free time, the free space wipe takes about 2 hours for 1 pass on my PC with 200GB free space.
The program says 3 passes is needed for secure home, upto 23 passes for military standard.
This takes a while, but it removes data to the point where it will be unbelievably difficult to recover anything! The encryption is also very good!
-
Stuart
How secure it needs to be depends on free time, the free space wipe takes about 2 hours for 1 pass on my PC with 200GB free space.
The program says 3 passes is needed for secure home, upto 23 passes for military standard.
This takes a while, but it removes data to the point where it will be unbelievably difficult to recover anything! The encryption is also very good!
-
Stuart
That sounds like the ticket - thanks. I read somewhere that formatting a drive doesn't erase the data.
just discovered the PGP free trial doesn't support Win98. However, just found this page:
www.snapfiles.com/Freeware/security/fwerase.html
www.snapfiles.com/Freeware/security/fwerase.html
I'd also recommend using a hammer and bonfire, as well as the data shredding options.
For the experts:
Out of interest, if you had (say) a 80GB hard drive, with ~40GB used, would not making a copy of the 40GB data (to the free space), then deleting everything have a similar effect to shredding/formatting? Or is there a significant amount of unused space associated with every file?
For the experts:
Out of interest, if you had (say) a 80GB hard drive, with ~40GB used, would not making a copy of the 40GB data (to the free space), then deleting everything have a similar effect to shredding/formatting? Or is there a significant amount of unused space associated with every file?
lurker said:
I'd also recommend using a hammer and bonfire, as well as the data shredding options.
For the experts:
Out of interest, if you had (say) a 80GB hard drive, with ~40GB used, would not making a copy of the 40GB data (to the free space), then deleting everything have a similar effect to shredding/formatting? Or is there a significant amount of unused space associated with every file?
For the experts:
Out of interest, if you had (say) a 80GB hard drive, with ~40GB used, would not making a copy of the 40GB data (to the free space), then deleting everything have a similar effect to shredding/formatting? Or is there a significant amount of unused space associated with every file?
This is basically how PGP free space wipe works, it performs a fill on the HD by overwriting all free space so the disk is full, then overwrites all the no full "free" space with empty space again, does this over and over. The more times you do it, the harder it is to recover the data. It's a bit scary sitting watching your HD fill up as the program is running!! There is also some free space at the end of files that should be wiped as well.
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Stuart
munky said:
What's the best (but preferably free) way of truly erasing all your data from a drive yet leaving the OS intact? Like if you were giving an old PC to a charity
personally, I wouldn't give the machine away with the drive.
i'd remove the drive and put a few holes through it with a 1/4" drill bit. alot of the banks do this nowadays as its the only real way to really kill the data.
have to agree, if used for personal data, nothing to stop someone recovering the files and using them for whatever, last drive i trashed, simply took it apart and sanded the platters 
, given a few to friends but not more than that, killdisk seems pretty good, then run it as a slave and then overwrite with something like east tec eraser
, given a few to friends but not more than that, killdisk seems pretty good, then run it as a slave and then overwrite with something like east tec eraser
Comprehensive article here, for those with no life:
http://cmrr.ucsd.edu/Hughes/DataSanit
There is apparently also a bios util (Secure Erase) that can be used.
Above info gleaned from:
http://blogs.zdnet.com/storage/?p=129
http://cmrr.ucsd.edu/Hughes/DataSanit
There is apparently also a bios util (Secure Erase) that can be used.
Above info gleaned from:
http://blogs.zdnet.com/storage/?p=129
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