Questions tagged [deletion]
Secure deletion of data.
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Wipe data from many storage devices
This software for wipe devices of storage:
Active@Kill Disk - Hard Drive Eraser.
Eraser.
Shredit for Windows.
Disk Wipe.
Darik's Boot and Nuke (DBAN).
I wonder if this software is able to use for ...
4
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1
answer
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Router - is there anything to "wipe" before selling
It's a Linksys WRT1900AC. Beyond resetting the firmware is there anything else I should consider as it's been used in a business. I'm thinking about personally identifiable information from a legal ...
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Wiping a server with sensitive data
ORIGINAL QUESTION:
We have servers which we want to wipe and sell due to an environmentally friendly scheme, recycling, reducing carbon footprint etc. The servers have a raid configuration.
After ...
3
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1
answer
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Wiping data properly in LUKS encrypted drive
Is it enough just to remove the header of LUKS device to wiping (unrecognizable) the data completely? Or it is recoverable (I don't want to recover though)? I need some safeguard to wiping my ...
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1
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Does editing a file and saving it permanently overwrite it?
Does editing a file and saving it permanently overwrite it? Is this a foolproof method of data destruction? I have a file that I need to fully erase, is this the way? I am running Linux and the file ...
4
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Is it secure to wipe a file in a Virtualbox disk if the vbox disk file is on an ssd?
Preface
I searched for an answer to my question and found related questions which do not cover my question completely. Like:
On SSD deleting:
Can Widped SSD Data be recovered
How to securely delete ...
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If I sell my printer, can the last printed pages be recovered? And how can I wipe it?
I have a Brother 5470-DW Printer. I want to sell it but wanted to make sure all the last prints can't be recovered.
If I sold my printer could the last pages printed be recovered? How can I wipe all ...
3
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1
answer
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Is SSD encryption useless on data already present?
The reason I ask this question, is that presumably when contents on an SSD are encrypted, the unencrypted data is overwritten with its encrypted version. This study tells us that overwritten data can ...
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How to secure erase files and folders? [duplicate]
How to securely erase/delete files or folders in different file systems (NTFS, ext3, ext4) ? Need to delete files so it will be impossible to recover that files and no traces of metadata and traces in ...
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Will overwriting a file before deleting guarantee the destruction of the original file's data [duplicate]
Say I have a file I want to erase. Simply deleting it is not enough. It still resides in the recycle bin. Emptying the recycle bin does little as well, the actual data is not deleted just the pointer, ...
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1
answer
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How can I delete Telegram messages from their server? [closed]
Since I heard that Telegram stores all the chats including messages, pictures, audio & video material on their servers (cloud) I would like to know how can I delete all of my chats from my phone ...
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Use explicit_bzero() to zero entire memory
Functions like bzero(), explicit_bzero() and ZeroMemory are designed to delete sensitive data from RAM (Like keys). Can I use explicit_bzero() to delete entire RAM (e.g. 2 GB RAM)? Is this a feasible ...
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1
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Erase RAM while device is on [closed]
Is there anyway to get rid of the data in RAM without powering off the system? or better to say how we can reduce the chance of getting meaning full information from the volatile memory while the ...
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1
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How to completely remove all traces of a file on Linux? (Overriding everything if needed)
How can I delete a file and completely remove it from the system FOREVER. I does have in mind that it's needed to override it. But how can I do that?
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Is disk wiping required for full disk encryption if that disk was encrypted before?
It is generally recommended to safely erase the content of a disk before encrypting it, to avoid some forensic attacks.
But is it necessary when that disk was encrypted before ? Wouldn't the data ...
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wipe encrypted disk by nulling the first few bytes?
If I encrypt a whole partition with AES, is it secure to just overwrite the first few bytes of the partition in order to make it completly unreadable even if an attacker knows the passphrase to access ...
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BIOS rootkit : Computrace and Wiping SSD HPA on Linux + protect it with custom encryption
My primary goal is to close firmware backoors. First, I want to know if my plan might work or not, and if it is a good idea, how to implement it:
I erased preinstalled Windows and installed Linux ...
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1
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Are there any real life scenarios where usage of the Gutmann method is appropriate? [duplicate]
Peter Gutmann himself wrote the following:
If you're using a drive which uses encoding technology X, you only
need to perform the passes specific to X, and you never need to
perform all 35 ...
2
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2
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Is using video editing software to fill SSD with junk video secure?
I'm about to sell an old 128GB external SSD, and I've read various guides saying it's difficult to be sure that data is erased when using traditional zero-fills etc.
I'm on Mac OSx, and I got the ...
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Privacy data concern: Facebook account appearing with a search for phone number, despite it never being added - what should I do? [closed]
Something that's concerned me recently is "doxing" or the searching for and posting of personal information. Recently I carried out essentially an audit of my personal security online and discovered a ...
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Should I wipe my device when leaving the company? [closed]
I'm leaving my company soon.
Only one person in the whole company has admin-rights on client machines and does the reinstalls. To save time only the old userprofile gets deactivated and a new one ...
4
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Is it safe to rm -rf an untrusted directory?
There are a lot of linking tools(symlinks, hard links, mount, etc.) available. Suppose a disgruntled employee gets the idea that he's going to hide a link to the root directory or some mission-...
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Is there a portable memory device with an offline erase technique? (such as an erase switch?)
I know about the USB devices that have a write protection switch that disables writing on the device side, are there devices that have a similar hardware switch that permanently erases the devices ...
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Can live bootable usb be infected by malware on hard disk?
I have an old hard disk which I think has every kind of malware on it, maybe even MBR malware. It is also possible that there is malware for Linux on it too, because the disk is a dual boot Windows XP ...
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Is encrypting whole drive with a randomly generated key better than erasing?
I was trying to find better ways of quickly deleting files in such a way that they cant be recovered at all.
Is encrypting drive with a completely pseudo random key using some block chain better than ...
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How secure is manually over writting files?
Say I have 100 image files, all different names, I batch rename them 1-100.jpg, I then change the extension of all the files to .txt. I then make 100 blank text files and over write the converted ...
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Securely deleting files from inside a Veracrypt volume
My question relates to this old thread on the Veracrypt forum (I didn't get any response when I posted there, so here I am):
https://sourceforge.net/p/veracrypt/discussion/general/thread/bf48efbd/
I ...
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Does Amazon S3 deletion "shred" your object
I believe Amazon states that all deletions of objects are irreversible. But for security reasons, how "shreded" is such deletion? For example, supposing a hack to Amazon S3, could anyone recover your ...
4
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Best current methods for preventing data leakage from SSD
I'm wondering about the current best practices for ensuring data confidentiality on an SSD used as an OS boot drive (under Linux). Important considerations are:
Ensures against data leakage in the ...
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2
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Is storing CVV in two parts separately a violation of PCI?
I was going through the integration documents of a payment processor, and as per my understanding of the code, docs and disassembly, they are doing the following:
Encrypting the CVV on the server-...
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Product Verification System [closed]
I'm thinking about a system that will allow my end users to verify their products with the manufacture key/imei number.
I'm planning to check that key against my information saved in server and let ...
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1
answer
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Safe erase of a Toshiba SSD with Absolute Secure Disk software
I have a SSD drive extracted from a crashed laptop which seems to be working, but it's got a Absolute Secure Disk sofware which asks for password when I try to boot from the drive or denies any access ...
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1
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Security of deleted files and their traces
I refer to the following link:
Deleted files and their traces
I am trying to ensure security of deleted files when copying from one machine to another.
The original poster asked if simply copying ...
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Is Windows 10's TRIM implementation secure
In terms of data deletion everyone knows that once you delete something from your harddisk it stays there, and is recoverable, until it is overwritten.
With classical spinning harddrives, the best ...
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How to check whether the erase was secure enough?
Edit: this is not about how to securely erase, but how to check whether the erase was secure enough.
I have over written my SSD with very large video files, in order to overwrite any sensitive data I ...
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How to erase as much as possible an SSD without ATA Secure Erase?
The question is almost completely answered. However, more details are still needed. See Update 2 down here.
I've learnt that the ATA Secure Erase is uncorrectly implemented in SSDs (sources are down ...
3
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Data 'dust' left over other than on the HDD?
I was working on a project which contained very classified information.
I am now planning on using the computer for personal work but I'm worried that replacing the HDD won't be enough.
Is there any ...
3
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3
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How secure is Secure Erase option in BIOS?
I have been exploring data security lately and came across HDD data recovery. I now know that a format simply deletes the "pointers" to files and directories and that data is still there. The only way ...
2
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1
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User ID Soft Delete or Hard Delete?
Is there any particular reason (security) for us to implement Soft Delete Mechanism on Deleting User ID or Hard Delete.
I am trying to make my user id better for my web application
thank you.
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How to respond to a user requesting deletion of their online account [closed]
My website occasionally receives requests from users asking for their account to be deleted. The website itself is a dating site that stores messages between users, personal information they add to ...
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Is file shredding effective in a virtual machine?
I understand that people with a need to make sensitive data unrecoverable use file shredding to achieve it. This means writing over the physical areas of the storage media in more or less ...
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2
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Chances of recovery of data from iPhone 5s if memory has been overwritten 35 times?
Use the app 'shredit!' and do the 35 time overwrite. Then you fill the phone with unnecessary data and then reset it to factory settings and erase. What are the chances of recovery of data that was ...
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2
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Is data in iPhone "spare" flash memory also encrypted and shredded?
First I'd like to ask is flash memory used in an iPhone? If yes then please answer my next question.
Flash memory uses wear levelling (changing the physical location on the memory of a logical ...
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How to securely sanitize data tapes, and audit the results?
I work at an electronics recycling facility and we were just presented with an offer from a client that would like to buy our used data tapes. Our problem is that we have never sanitized data tapes as ...
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Windows disk write - does short write fill whole cluster?
Suppose I have a Windows program that writes to a hard disk. The hard disk has physical sectors of 512 byte length.
These sectors are accessed as clusters of 4 kilobytes each. Therefore, each cluster ...
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Is there a real-world example of SSD data recovery?
Secure data deletion is known to be more complicated and elusive on a solid-state drive than for a regular hard drive. For instance, the logical block mapping on the SSD's flash translation layer ...
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Are deleted files more or less likely to be overwritten than blank space?
Let's say that I have some files on a hard drive (the data for each file is represented by a different letter):
xxxoooozzzz--------------------
Now let's say that I delete file Z without ...
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Live OS : secure file deletion
In the case of a Live OS (i.e Tails) where filesystems are kept in RAM, is there any difference in the way a file is deleted ?
Specific case considered :
files "1.jpg" and "2.jpg" in a running Live ...
3
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3
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I am leaving my company. I have been asked to leave my company laptop and a password to access it. What should i log out of
I have been asked to leave my company laptop with a password(which I will change and share) to access it.
The reasons for this have been explained to me and are invalid, alas.
I am going to assume ...
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Is it secure to overwrite unencrypted files with encrypted ones?
If I have a text file on my desktop and I encrypt it (as in replace it with an encrypted version, not create a secondary file) will the old file still be recoverable? In other words if you replace the ...