Permanently erase and delete computer files

When it comes to Windows file management, there are a few words that might come to mind.  Archiving, storing, compressing are but a few common terms.  In recent years, especially when litigation is involved, there are things that businesses now have to accomplish with respect to handling digital documents.  Of course your average individual is not excluded by any means. 

For the sake of argument, we will say you are in the unfortunate position of having to answer questions about data handling.  You rattle off your shopping list of duties and practices regarding an excellent combination of on-site and off-site backup and storage procedures.  Your system makes it easy to retrieve older data with relative ease and speed.  This could be an enterprise grade system for the business system administrator, or encrypted online storage for the home computer user.  In either event, you feel confident with your data management.

But, if someone were to inquire as to how you dispose of your computer files, would your answer be dumping the Recycling Bin?  Do you reload Windows on a yearly basis to get rid of older file clutter?  Think you are safe? 

The fact of the matter is that in either of the above scenarios, your supposedly deleted data can still be retrieved.  True enough, you can do disastrous things to your hard drive to make it unrecoverable, and more than likely unusable from that point on. 

Strong magnets, steamrollers, and repeated blows with a steel hammer have profound effects on a hard disk drive, and make data recovery tricky.  Let’s assume that you are leaning towards keeping your hard drive and computer intact.  In this instance, you would need something that would securely erase data from your hard drive.

Note that if you are simply trying to erase Internet browsing history, you don’t need to use a program like I’m about to mention, just read my earlier post. 

The Eraser program (Can be found here: http://www.heidi.ie/node/6) makes the elimination of hard drive data a snap.  In a nutshell, Eraser takes your target data, be it files, folders, or both, and writes over the file with random data when it deletes the items.  This small program is very efficient at getting rid of any files you no longer need or use.

In the main interface for Eraser, you may notice that it is not cluttered with an overabundance of choices.  On the left hand side of the window, you will note two items:  On-Demand and Scheduler.  I will not go into too much detail about the Scheduler, because it is simply a tool to automatically run Eraser on a target of your choice, at a specified time and day.  The Scheduler works well enough, though I do not know anyone who uses it.  The people I know who have this program prefer to use it as needed.  For now, I will illustrate the use of the On-Demand tool.

When you click on On-Demand, then the New Task button (seen as a Windows-type unknown file icon in the upper left hand section); you are presented with the options of erasing unused disk space, File in Folder, or just a File.  Keep in mind that choosing the File in Folder selection enables you to choose Subfolders and removing the folder target itself.  Towards the bottom of these options, you can tell your computer to Restart, Sleep, or Shutdown when the task is completed.  It is not a necessity, just there if you want it.

When you click on OK, this does not run the task just yet, but it adds it to the task list.  When you wish to run the task, simply right-click on the item and select Run; or Run All is you wish to execute all the tasks on your list.

Now that we have a checklist of things to get rid of, we may want to let Eraser know how aggressive to be when removing files.  Depending on the type of files you are erasing, you may want to tweak the number of passes Eraser does with respect to overwriting with random data.  In order to find out how thoroughly it will attack the files, click on Edit, then navigate to Preferences, and then Erasing.

It may seem odd that we have to control a throttle of sorts on a program that wipes data from a hard drive.  Keep in mind that there are some files that you have to be cautious about how they are erased.  To keep a long explanation short, read Eraser’s help section regarding compressed files and partitions.  There are times where a 35 pass data wipe is not in your computer’s best interest.  As a good rule of thumb, the more passes Eraser has to make, and the more data to be erased, the longer the process will take.

Besides the actual program itself, Eraser adds a couple of options to your right-click context menu.  These options are Erase and Erase Secure Move.

The Erase selection is just a quick way to delete files and folders, without having to go into the Eraser program itself.  However, the Eraser Secure Move is an nice extra to have.  What this item does is move data from one place to another, like Cut and Paste; but it erases any trace of the original location, as if it was never there. 

A good scenario for this tool would be moving data from an older computer to a newer one.  Perhaps you want to resell your older Windows computer, but do not want to wipe Windows from the computer.  With the Erase Secure Move, you can safely move your data to an external USB hard drive, for example, and ensure the buyer cannot “accidentally” recover data, which you did not want to accompany the older computer.

Before this wraps up, I want to pass along a word of caution.  Eraser is very good at data destruction.  Once you use Eraser to rid yourself of files or folders, you cannot get them back.  Even with the high-tech type recovery tools, and a lot of investment, your data would come back as garbage at best.  Choose your data targets carefully.

There are many other free programs out there, like FileShredder, that can permanently delete your computer files.