How easy is it for someone to access deleted data from your hard drive?

Question

I'm quite worried coz recently I deleted lots of information and uninstalled programs before passing my dying laptop to someone else. By the time this person got it we discovered that the hard drive casing is shattered due to a heavy book having fallen on the keyboard a while back, after which the pc started acting up, so I decided to start cleaning it down and give it to someone to salvage parts if they wanted.

Now I've heard that deleting stuff (personal documents, photos, etc. that were in the trash) can be accessed if those files weren't overwritten by something else - new data, new programs, whatever.

How easy would it be for someone to retrieve my deleted data, I'm just concerned about security issues.

Answer 1

Well

i want you to know first that

when u delete a file or an image (you don't delete it for real)

as u know all file in your Computer is looks like this in your Hard disk

1000111001010011000

and i don't want to explain more

well

when u delete file from the windows

it's only change the first number witch (1) to (0)

and that make the file not exist....

yes that's true (your pictures is still in your hard drive)

but you must know that when you put new files in your hard drive

it's possible to write over the deleted files

i hope you got it

------------

now let's go to the how do get them back

it's hard to do that manual

so use one of these programs

1- Final data 2 or higher (i recommended it)

2- Recorder V5.4

3-recover 4all 2.9

4-Undelete Plus v2.3

and try also do to download this program Recuva from http://recuva.com

i hope u get it

Answer 2

Very easy to retrieve deleted files even from a formatted hard drive.

Believe it or not,  the surest method is to physically damage the disks in a hard drive so the data cannot be retrieved. Like using an axe to brake the disks.

Hard drives are not like tape recorders you don't actually delete files you overwrite them hundreds and many more times to make them unrecoverable and then it still may be possible to retrieve some files.

To be absolutely safe use an axe when possible.  

Answer 3

fairly easy for an expert. quite hard for the average user

Answer 4

To recover a simply deleted file all you need is something like http://www.softperfect.com/products/file... which can be run from a flash stick (no install needed) - less than a minute.

If you want your files unrecoverable use a shredder like http://www.fileshredder.org/

If you want to give away a hard disk (alone or in a pc) you need to wipe it clean with http://www.dban.org/

Answer 5

Try this software (Evidence Eleminator) if you are worried about deleted data being retrieved. It works and you can get a free demo at cnet.

But be sure to go to help file before using, there are some things you must do before running the program. Alot of people make the mistake of just downloading and running it.

Answer 6

easily enough.

deleted files are not really erased, just removed from the directory. the actual data is still there until the os decides to reuse that sector.

the hard part of recovering data is that it might be sprinkled all over the place.

defragging can reduce the exposure some because it physiacally moves some files around. formatting supposedly wipes everything.

there are also utilities available that really will wipe out the old data.