|
  |
|
|
Cleaning Out Your Hard Disk
To remove data from your hard disk, do it like the military guys do. That is either run the disk through an industrial strength magnetic device or wipe it with software that writes over it - not once or twice, but a few hundred times. Whatever you do, don't merrily chuck out the old machine in the trash because the data in the hard disk could end up in the wrong hands. The job of the hard drive is to log activity. So everything that you type at your keyboard will be cached in your hard drive at some point. Like the angry letter to your boss you started bashing out but deleted on second thought, and the snide remarks or flirtatious asides you've typed while chatting online with your friends. When a computer forensics guy looks at a hard disk it is these "fragmented text" that they seek out to help piece a full picture of what someone has been up to on his PC. To keep people in the dark, you will need to wipe out your hard drive: delete all the files and programs and more. When you hit delete to get rid of the file, you're not really deleting it. What the act does is it deletes all the reference to the file. That's like removing an entry from the contents page of a book, but not actually removing the pages of the chapter. This indicates to the computer that the space originally assigned to the file can now be written over. With formatting the same thing happens, and data is not actually removed. Yet, these spaces are also not over-written with new data right away, and the computer decides this randomly. Hard drives are so large these days, the chances of data remaining there are quite high. It's not until a hard drive is getting full that the operating system will start overwriting the sectors marked as deleted. This means alot of old data is usually hiding somewhere. And even a slightly tech savvy person could recover the files, with software that can be downloaded online for free. So how do you ensure thorough cleansing? The most foolproof way to wipe out the data from a hard disk, is to run the disk through a degaussing device, say computer forensics and security experts. About the size of a washing machine, the device uses a very strong magnet to scramble the hard disk, wiping out all the information on it. The catch though, is that this renders the hard disk useless. A less severe way to remove data is to use wiping software. This method preserves the hard disk, but scrubs out the files and all the programs on it. Such software will fill the hard disk with random data, messing up data patterns on the disk, so even computer forensics specialist cannot recover them. But be careful of some freeware easily available online, say the experts. It's not a quick process to erase a hard drive correctly. You have to leave it running overnight. If you've got a product that can erase in 30 seconds, you can be sure there's not much erasing going on there. |
|
 |
|
No reactions yet.
Please login or sign up to rate this intel.
Please login or sign up to add a comment.
The copyright for this content entitled "Cleaning Out Your Hard Disk" has been specified by the contributor as:
All Rights Reserved
This content may not be copied, distributed or adapted by anyone under any circumstances.
|
|
May, 2012
2008
January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November, December
2009
January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November, December
2010
January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November, December
2011
January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November, December
2012
January, February, March, April, May
|
|
Not a member yet?
Qondio is a powerful network for making it online. If you have a website to
promote, we can help.
Sign up and get in on the action.
|
|
Welcome to Qondio! Discover the awesome power this network can deliver by going to our About page. Or you could skip straight to the Sign Up form.
|
|
