Does formatting really get rid of everything

I have received some spam mail from a software called Evidence Eliminator. They claim that formatting a drive doesn't really get rid of all the files you have had on your computer.

Is that true?

Regards
Chris

 

Ok, So if you format and then re-install windows all the old info from the previous format will be removed or???

 

clarification

If you are asking whether your settings and data will still be there after you format, the short answer is "no ". They will still, as the others have explained, be on the disk, but they will not be available to you immediately or easily retrieved. Do not format without doing all of your important backups. Be prepared to reinstall all of your software.

Johanna

 

This is quite scarry,

We have 3 computers in the office that we wanted to sell, however, it seems that we would be breaking our confidentiality agreement with our customers by doing so.



CP

 

That's handy to know. i bought Norton Ghost about 3 months ago and still haven't installed it.

I think it is time to open the packaging and take a clser look. i thought it was just for cloning my hard drive

CP

 

How sensitive is the data on the hard disks? If it absolutely must be confidential, and you think the hard drives might end up in unfriendly hands, then there are several thorough steps you can take to wipe the disks so clean that even Law Enforcement would have a difficult time retrieving it, and it would be beyond the grasp of the average user. If the data is not going to violate laws, ethics or ruin your business, if it gets into the wrong hands, a complete format and reinstall of the OS should be sufficient to protect your interests.

If you boot to an ME floppy that has NFDisk (does that stand for no-freaking-disk?) on it, theoretically it takes 7 runs to overwrite all data. I use it once, and have never had old stuff pop up on me. I once tried to find some old stuff after doing that, and was unsuccessful, however, I didn't put forth the effort the authorities could. Your privacy requirements may be a lot stricter than mine need to be!

My point is that it takes motivation, determination and third party software to recover the data, and the data might be corrupt anyway, so if it's not a major security risk (and only you can determine that) a full format and fresh install is enough of a deterrent to shield your customers' privacy.

Johanna

 

Sdelete from sysinternals.com is a free utility that does as good a job of wiping both FAT & NTFS drives as any I know.

There is a good explanation on the link for exactly what it does and how. It will clean free space with one exception. All data will absolutely be destroyed from both occupied and free space. Gone. Never to be recovered by anyone.

File names from free space will not be removed. So some names of previously deleted files can remain on the drive.

 

Well, I misspelled it, which doesn't help. It's NFDisc. I should know that, because it has to be typed out to zero zap. I searched the web, too, and found nothing helpful on it, which amazes me, because it is a handy tool.
I have no idea where I got it, but I've had it a long time and used it often. It's not a big file, but it's powerful. Maybe someone with more experience can give us some history on it. It doesn't work with XP (DOS based) hence the ME boot floppy to use it.

Johanna

 

Too bad I can't remember the name of the so-called wiping software that was used by a guy in the news arrested for child ****. Apparently it didn't work too well for him. A good thing in this case, but it was a well-known product.

I'd go with the SysInternals tool that Newt mentioned. They are reputable and know what they are doing.

You should be suspicious of any tool that claims to be able to clean a disk while Windows is running.

It looks like Johanna's Nfdisc comes with Sygate disk software. Here is a list of cammand line options:

http://206.204.105.35/support/kb/disc/tb/nfdisc_switch.html#NFDISC_0

After searching their Ftp site for a while, I found this:

ftp://ftp.seagate.com/techsuppt/seagate_utils/nfdisc12.exe

 

That was interesting, Abraxas, thank you for the links. I had no idea it was a Sygate tool, or any of the other things it does. All I have ever used nfdisc for is wiping a system prior to a clean install, and it has always done that very well. I would have guessed it to be a Norton tool! I appreciate the information, and the time it took to find it.

Johanna

 

Hi, Johanna.

You mentioned "zap" so that must be the one.

It really didn't take long to find it. I never use Google, maybe one of the only people who doesn't. Guess it's because I hate the word, "Google ", and because it returns too many results to be useful ( to me).

But, I seem to find things anyway

 

A lot depends upon how sensitive the information on the hard drive is. Despite everything, some forensics programs are better than others. I mean sometimes it may be just a matter of how much time and money one wants to spend.

A crook may spend more time on a bank's throwaway than on my computer and the government will spend all kinds of time on an Al Qida computer.

Low level formats a couple of times ought to clean out most hard drives good enough.

As for those erasure programs, how do YOU know they acutally work? You have to have your computer seized homebrew!

The only 100% effective thing is to melt the hard drive platter!

 

I have EnCase, a rather annoying piece of recovery software that is used by law enforcement.

It is constantly trying to prepare "case files" for presentation as evidence, though that is not what I am using it for. In fact, I never use it. Just got it to be prepared for that recovery day.

But it is very good at finding things.

To be exact, you need only heat the drive to the Curie Point of the magnetic material, but melting will do the job

 

I believe if you do a low level format all info will be wiped. Maxtor has a utility on their website to do this.

 

Eraser is another free tool for removing files and overwriting free space.

http://www.tolvanen.com/eraser/ has the documentation , a list of download mirror sites is here