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HOW TO DELETE PERSONAL DATA FROM MY COMPUTER BEFORE SELLING IT

HOW TO DELETE PERSONAL DATA FROM MY COMPUTER BEFORE SELLING IT




At a time when security is increasingly important the deletion of personal data becomes the highest priority.

If you plan to sell your hard drive, your PC or any device that has information storage, you should not forget to erase your personal data before selling it.

Many people think that formatting the hard drive and restoring the system is more than enough, but it is not entirely true, there are special programs that help recover files, even after formatting the hard drive.

During the useful life of your computer, the hard drive where documents and programs are permanently stored, also stores tons of personal data, such as passwords, browsing histories, emails, images and files that we have supposedly deleted.

When we delete some file or delete some password, we only delete the access to the file, the body of the file remains intact and it is possible to recover it with the help of a data recovery program such as "Restoration", "PC File Recovery", etc.

Following these 3 simple steps, you can erase that personal data from your computer, although it is not a completely secure erasure, if it will help you sell your computer with the tranquility that the information is more difficult to recover.

<h2>1.- Clean the registry.</h2>

Using a registry cleaner like CCleaner you can delete the registry of all your files and data, you can also do it manually, but it will take you a little more time.
Analyze your files with an antivirus to see if there are any files that you also have to delete and you must do it manually

<h2>2.- Defragment the hard disk.</h2>

The defragmentation tool is ideal for cleaning the hard drive because: it reorganizes the memory and leaves all the empty sectors in the corresponding site. Defragmentation is only a complementary erasing tool.

<h2>3.- Delete all personal data.</h2>

The best way we recommend, is using a erasing method with which you can select the files you want to delete. Having deleted everything you don't want that another person can recover from your computer (history, passwords, programs, etc.), you have to use a program of permanent erasing.

You can also format the hard drive and reinstall the operating system to ensure that in this way you do not miss any file you wish to delete.
According to the NSA (National Security Agency) formatting 3 times complete ensures the disappearance of our personal data.
If you need to do a deeper delete of the information we recommend a low level formatting and ultra secure deletion methods

FORMAT AT LOW LEVEL.

Low-level formatting not only overwrites the used sectors of the hard drive, but it can also repair problems related to the bad magnetization of the hard drive, to give a longer life to your hard drive. It also fixes read / write failures, which leave a complete sectors damaged and unusable.

This format consists of writing chains of ones and zeros to eliminate possible data residues.

<h2>WIPING</h2>

The only real way to destroy a file is to use a technique called "secure erasure" or "wiping".

This is done more professionally with special programs that repeatedly overwrite the hard drive segments, with random chains of ones and zeros that, for digital files, would be very similar to a paper shredder.

When we use these secure erasure programs, we must be very careful, since it will be "impossible" to recover the deleted files safely and we will never have access to them again. So, we recommend doing it with a profesional technician

The unrecoverable erasure process can take from 12 to 24 hours, depending on the disk capacity and speed; This deletion ensures that you will not have anything on your computer, not Windows, or programs, or anything. Except random series of ones and zeros.

If you want to make a secure erasure, contact us to show you the different personal and business solutions that we can offer to you.

Andrea Leal

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

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