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    Moved files... are they recoverable???

    Discussion in 'Windows OS and Software' started by blast1412, Dec 7, 2008.

  1. blast1412

    blast1412 Notebook Enthusiast

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    I'm going to sell my used external HD to my friend.
    However, I have a question before I hand it to him.
    I know that deleted files can be recovered pretty easily using a program, but how about if I simply move my files on that HD to another location?
    Would they be detectable using recovery tools if he scan the HD?
     
    blast1412, Dec 7, 2008
    #1
  2. nizzy1115

    nizzy1115 Notebook Prophet

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    Yes, then they would be visible in both locations...

    Think of a hard drive like a set of dresser drawers. With a lot of drawers. For simplicity sake, lets say each drawer holds one file. When you delete a file all it does is mark the outside of the drawer with a sticker that says empty while not really emptying the contents of the drawer until a new file is ready to be put into that drawer.

    If you move your file from one drawer to another, you have done just this. Marked the drawer that it is empty while not really removing the contents.

    The only way to remove the contents is to fill every one of those drawers at least once, but a minimum of 7 times to beat the highest level of programs to detect what file was in that drawer previously.

    You can use a program to clean your hard drive off such as http://www.dban.org/ dban's nuke disk.
     
    nizzy1115, Dec 7, 2008
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  3. Shyster1

    Shyster1 Notebook Nobel Laureate

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    Like Nizzy1115 said, your friend will be able to pull many/most of the files, even with the freebie data recovery utilities available out there, unless you use one of the apps that is made to wipe as many traces of the files as possible from the drive.

    Just moving them around and then deleting them won't do much, and might even make it easier for your friend to find them if it ends up causing another duplicate of the same file to be written to another part of the same external drive.
     
    Shyster1, Dec 8, 2008
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  4. shenoy22

    shenoy22 Newbie

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    Yes the data is still recoverable whether you delete the data permanently. What you need is drive wipe software to delete the data, so that no data recovery software can recover it. The drive wipe software wipe all the data from your hard drive, including previously deleted files, and leave them unrecoverable. You can try Stellar Drive Wipe software for this purpose.
     
    shenoy22, Dec 9, 2008
    #4