Posted: 10/21/2011 3:42:14 PM EDT
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I have an HD laptop that I'm going to sell. My question is how do I wipe the hard drive clean and still have it operational? I have used the laptop online in the past for bank transactions and other personal information websites. Do I even need to wipe it clean? I'm a computer ra-tard so any help is greatly appreciated. |
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if you can find it online, our office uses a DoD approve wipe. It gives you the option to format the hard drive 1 times, 3 times or 7 times. This will help make it hard to recover files but, not impossible.
The only way to ensure the files can not be recovered is to destroy the hard drive and put a new one in the laptop. |
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if you can find it online, our office uses a DoD approve wipe. It gives you the option to format the hard drive 1 times, 3 times or 7 times. This will help make it hard to recover files but, not impossible. The only way to ensure the files can not be recovered is to destroy the hard drive and put a new one in the laptop. Does format actually do anything other than wiping allocation tables and whatnot? I say delete all your shit, then fill it with gay porn, delete it all, fill it with gay porn again, repeat once more, then delete again. That way when they look at it under a microscope all they get is dick. |
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if you can find it online, our office uses a DoD approve wipe. It gives you the option to format the hard drive 1 times, 3 times or 7 times. This will help make it hard to recover files but, not impossible. The only way to ensure the files can not be recovered is to destroy the hard drive and put a new one in the laptop. the DoD approved wipe is approved for unclassified drives... it means very little to me... i would buy a new drive, they are much cheaper than trying to fix your credit if someone is able to recover your data from an old disk... |
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if you can find it online, our office uses a DoD approve wipe. It gives you the option to format the hard drive 1 times, 3 times or 7 times. This will help make it hard to recover files but, not impossible. The only way to ensure the files can not be recovered is to destroy the hard drive and put a new one in the laptop. the DoD approved wipe is approved for unclassified drives... it means very little to me... i would buy a new drive, they are much cheaper than trying to fix your credit if someone is able to recover your data from an old disk... If you give the wipe software the time to do several full over-writes I'd be comfortable selling the drive to about anyone other than the NSA. |
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if you can find it online, our office uses a DoD approve wipe. It gives you the option to format the hard drive 1 times, 3 times or 7 times. This will help make it hard to recover files but, not impossible. The only way to ensure the files can not be recovered is to destroy the hard drive and put a new one in the laptop. the DoD approved wipe is approved for unclassified drives... it means very little to me... i would buy a new drive, they are much cheaper than trying to fix your credit if someone is able to recover your data from an old disk... If you give the wipe software the time to do several full over-writes I'd be comfortable selling the drive to about anyone other than the NSA. I wouldn't.... i guess i'm paranoid... |
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Download freeware version of http://www.killdisk.com/
Run DOD wipe.. Go to sleep.. Wake up tomorrow and sell laptop with no regrets. if yoru really paranoid run DOD wipe again with a few of the advanced settings that will write random ones and zeros on the disk between wipes. Profit. then sleep like a baby |
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if you can find it online, our office uses a DoD approve wipe. It gives you the option to format the hard drive 1 times, 3 times or 7 times. This will help make it hard to recover files but, not impossible. The only way to ensure the files can not be recovered is to destroy the hard drive and put a new one in the laptop. the DoD approved wipe is approved for unclassified drives... it means very little to me... i would buy a new drive, they are much cheaper than trying to fix your credit if someone is able to recover your data from an old disk... If you give the wipe software the time to do several full over-writes I'd be comfortable selling the drive to about anyone other than the NSA. I wouldn't.... i guess i'm paranoid... Yes you are. selling a drive that has been dod wiped numerous times is safe for 99% of people out there. unless you got something serious on a drive i would not worry about it to much. |
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There are plenty of good ways to wipe the drive (DBAN, and others). The challenge for the OP is in restoring the OS/drivers/apps after the wipe.
OP, depending on the make of your laptop, you might consider buying a Factory Restore DVD from the manufacturer for like $25 or so. Wipe your system using DBAN or some other tool, and then restore the laptop and original hard-drive to the Factory image (including the OS, and anything else it came with) using the restore DVD. Then sell that puppy on Craigslist and be done with it. |
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if you can find it online, our office uses a DoD approve wipe. It gives you the option to format the hard drive 1 times, 3 times or 7 times. This will help make it hard to recover files but, not impossible. The only way to ensure the files can not be recovered is to destroy the hard drive and put a new one in the laptop. the DoD approved wipe is approved for unclassified drives... it means very little to me... i would buy a new drive, they are much cheaper than trying to fix your credit if someone is able to recover your data from an old disk... If you give the wipe software the time to do several full over-writes I'd be comfortable selling the drive to about anyone other than the NSA. After properly wiping a drive once, I'd be comfortable giving it to the NSA. It's physics. |
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if you can find it online, our office uses a DoD approve wipe. It gives you the option to format the hard drive 1 times, 3 times or 7 times. This will help make it hard to recover files but, not impossible. The only way to ensure the files can not be recovered is to destroy the hard drive and put a new one in the laptop. Does format actually do anything other than wiping allocation tables and whatnot? Not really, that is why you need a product that writes to the hard drive. The format gets rid of the allocation tables but until the space is overwritten by something else, it can be recovered. The only way to ensure 100% that the files are not recoverable, is to destroy the hard drive in a shredder. |
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if you can find it online, our office uses a DoD approve wipe. It gives you the option to format the hard drive 1 times, 3 times or 7 times. This will help make it hard to recover files but, not impossible. The only way to ensure the files can not be recovered is to destroy the hard drive and put a new one in the laptop. the DoD approved wipe is approved for unclassified drives... it means very little to me... i would buy a new drive, they are much cheaper than trying to fix your credit if someone is able to recover your data from an old disk... If you give the wipe software the time to do several full over-writes I'd be comfortable selling the drive to about anyone other than the NSA. After properly wiping a drive once, I'd be comfortable giving it to the NSA. It's physics. Its the physics of magnets, which no one but the NSA truly understands... |
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Quoted: Our IT dept do that too. Then they drill at least three 1/4" holes through the drive.......... Then they toss it in the compactor that gets delivered straight to the local trash incinerator.........if you can find it online, our office uses a DoD approve wipe. It gives you the option to format the hard drive 1 times, 3 times or 7 times. This will help make it hard to recover files but, not impossible. |
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if you can find it online, our office uses a DoD approve wipe. It gives you the option to format the hard drive 1 times, 3 times or 7 times. This will help make it hard to recover files but, not impossible. The only way to ensure the files can not be recovered is to destroy the hard drive and put a new one in the laptop. the DoD approved wipe is approved for unclassified drives... it means very little to me... i would buy a new drive, they are much cheaper than trying to fix your credit if someone is able to recover your data from an old disk... If you give the wipe software the time to do several full over-writes I'd be comfortable selling the drive to about anyone other than the NSA. After properly wiping a drive once, I'd be comfortable giving it to the NSA. It's physics. Could you safely, sure. I just think that it's a healthy paranoia to choose customers more wisely, not that the NSA needs five year old hard drives. |
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if you can find it online, our office uses a DoD approve wipe. It gives you the option to format the hard drive 1 times, 3 times or 7 times. This will help make it hard to recover files but, not impossible. The only way to ensure the files can not be recovered is to destroy the hard drive and put a new one in the laptop. the DoD approved wipe is approved for unclassified drives... it means very little to me... i would buy a new drive, they are much cheaper than trying to fix your credit if someone is able to recover your data from an old disk... If you give the wipe software the time to do several full over-writes I'd be comfortable selling the drive to about anyone other than the NSA. I wouldn't.... i guess i'm paranoid... Yes you are. selling a drive that has been dod wiped numerous times is safe for 99% of people out there. unless you got something serious on a drive i would not worry about it to much. 99% of the people means for 1 out of 100 people it wouldn't be safe? Multiple DOD wipes is darn safe. Is it possible to recover data from a drive after a single wipe? Not with any ordinary equipment or effort. Nobody is going to do this for a credit card number. How may of you guys are on wireless? How many are using WEP or WPA AES? |
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if you can find it online, our office uses a DoD approve wipe. It gives you the option to format the hard drive 1 times, 3 times or 7 times. This will help make it hard to recover files but, not impossible. The only way to ensure the files can not be recovered is to destroy the hard drive and put a new one in the laptop. the DoD approved wipe is approved for unclassified drives... it means very little to me... i would buy a new drive, they are much cheaper than trying to fix your credit if someone is able to recover your data from an old disk... If you give the wipe software the time to do several full over-writes I'd be comfortable selling the drive to about anyone other than the NSA. After properly wiping a drive once, I'd be comfortable giving it to the NSA. It's physics. The NSA has no approved method of sanitizing a HDD of classified data less physical destruction.... And those guidelines came out years ago so you do the math |
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if you can find it online, our office uses a DoD approve wipe. It gives you the option to format the hard drive 1 times, 3 times or 7 times. This will help make it hard to recover files but, not impossible. The only way to ensure the files can not be recovered is to destroy the hard drive and put a new one in the laptop. the DoD approved wipe is approved for unclassified drives... it means very little to me... i would buy a new drive, they are much cheaper than trying to fix your credit if someone is able to recover your data from an old disk... If you give the wipe software the time to do several full over-writes I'd be comfortable selling the drive to about anyone other than the NSA. After properly wiping a drive once, I'd be comfortable giving it to the NSA. It's physics. The NSA has no approved method of sanitizing a HDD of classified data less physical destruction.... And those guidelines came out years ago so you do the math They came out about 25 years ago, and haven't really ever been updated since. 25 years ago, there was a theoretical method of attempting to recover data using a SEM. That method was never (that we know of) even attempted, and never (again, that we know of) used to recover anything, anywhere. The physics of modern hard drives move it outside the realm of the theoretical and into the realm of unicorns and fairy dust. Somebody wrote a good paper on it a few years back –– their conclusion was pretty much that there was absolutely no way a properly wiped (even single pass) hard drive could have any data recovered from it. |
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Quoted: Use the factory restore disks and when installing the OS, be sure to select the "format" process. LOL, like that do anything. Follow DOD data wipe standards. Get darik's boot and nuke writing over the origional deleted information 7 times before it is considered un recoverable. Then take it to the range and blow it to pieces. |
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Use the factory restore disks and when installing the OS, be sure to select the "format" process. This. Most laptops come with the proper software to return it to factory settings. Your other chose is to purchase a third party software designed to sanitize personal information etc. |
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DBAN does NOT wipe bad sectors marked "bad", use with caution.
Use this. |
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Good to know. Thanks. |
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I did not know that DBAN wouldn't touch sectors marked bad, but sitting here and thinking about it, it makes sense. Depending on when the sector was marked bad, not wiping it probably will still have nil effect. Anyway secure erase either writes zeros or a pre-determined pattern set by the device manufacturer. Neither of which are random. So if you are a true tin-foiler I supposed you should DBAN DOD wipe and then secure erase. Secure erase is epic on SSD's. You issue the command and then seconds later, BAM wiped disk. Anyway, I don't ever sell drives, I keep them in a box for standbys. Anything that is getting sent back to the manufacturer I just zero and call it good. Anything I *really* want gone gets zeroed and then shot. |
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I did not know that DBAN wouldn't touch sectors marked bad, but sitting here and thinking about it, it makes sense. Depending on when the sector was marked bad, not wiping it probably will still have nil effect. Anyway secure erase either writes zeros or a pre-determined pattern set by the device manufacturer. Neither of which are random. So if you are a true tin-foiler I supposed you should DBAN DOD wipe and then secure erase. Secure erase is epic on SSD's. You issue the command and then seconds later, BAM wiped disk. Anyway, I don't ever sell drives, I keep them in a box for standbys. Anything that is getting sent back to the manufacturer I just zero and call it good. Anything I *really* want gone gets zeroed and then shot. dd should work fine as well, just use urandom for a source and you're gtg. I don't know about SSDs. I have a suspicion that there is no way to adequately erase them, given the wear leveling and other things they have going on in firmware. I'd probably never put anything on them that wasn't encrypted first, and then destroy the drive physically when done. I'd need to do more research to form an opinion on them. |
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Quoted: dd should work fine as well, just use urandom for a source and you're gtg. I don't know about SSDs. I have a suspicion that there is no way to adequately erase them, given the wear leveling and other things they have going on in firmware. I'd probably never put anything on them that wasn't encrypted first, and then destroy the drive physically when done. I'd need to do more research to form an opinion on them. My understanding (and it's just my understanding) is that on SSD's secure erase bypasses all wear leveling, etc. It occurs so fast because they basically pull all busses to "low" simultaneously. Instant zeros everywhere. |
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dd should work fine as well, just use urandom for a source and you're gtg. I don't know about SSDs. I have a suspicion that there is no way to adequately erase them, given the wear leveling and other things they have going on in firmware. I'd probably never put anything on them that wasn't encrypted first, and then destroy the drive physically when done. I'd need to do more research to form an opinion on them. My understanding (and it's just my understanding) is that on SSD's secure erase bypasses all wear leveling, etc. It occurs so fast because they basically pull all busses to "low" simultaneously. Instant zeros everywhere. Interesting. That doesn't match my understanding of how they work, but I could be wrong –– I haven't studied them really at all yet. When you say "secure erase" are you talking about a built-in drive function? |
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Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: dd should work fine as well, just use urandom for a source and you're gtg. I don't know about SSDs. I have a suspicion that there is no way to adequately erase them, given the wear leveling and other things they have going on in firmware. I'd probably never put anything on them that wasn't encrypted first, and then destroy the drive physically when done. I'd need to do more research to form an opinion on them. My understanding (and it's just my understanding) is that on SSD's secure erase bypasses all wear leveling, etc. It occurs so fast because they basically pull all busses to "low" simultaneously. Instant zeros everywhere. Interesting. That doesn't match my understanding of how they work, but I could be wrong –– I haven't studied them really at all yet. When you say "secure erase" are you talking about a built-in drive function? Yes - the one that is part of the ATA specification. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Write_amplification#Secure_erase A slightly better explanation http://cmrr.ucsd.edu/people/Hughes/HDDEraseReadMe.txt |
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dd should work fine as well, just use urandom for a source and you're gtg. I don't know about SSDs. I have a suspicion that there is no way to adequately erase them, given the wear leveling and other things they have going on in firmware. I'd probably never put anything on them that wasn't encrypted first, and then destroy the drive physically when done. I'd need to do more research to form an opinion on them. My understanding (and it's just my understanding) is that on SSD's secure erase bypasses all wear leveling, etc. It occurs so fast because they basically pull all busses to "low" simultaneously. Instant zeros everywhere. Interesting. That doesn't match my understanding of how they work, but I could be wrong –– I haven't studied them really at all yet. When you say "secure erase" are you talking about a built-in drive function? Yes - the one that is part of the ATA specification. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Write_amplification#Secure_erase Ok, got it. Read this article –– Data Remanance. It sounds like the spec is probably good –– but this article, at least (it's wiki, so who knows), claims it's not always implemented correctly. Encrypted SSDs should be gtg –– all you have to do is dump the keys in some secure fashion and the drive is as good as overwritten. I'm not sure I trust the others yet... |